Audomarus

ON ST. AUDOMARUS, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR,

AT THE VILLA OF WAVRANS NEAR SAINT-OMER IN ARTOIS.

About the year DCLXX.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Audomarus bishop conf., at the villa of Wavrans near Saint-Omer in Artois (S.)

BY J. S.

§ I. The various Lives of S. Audomarus: which of these seems the most ancient, and to be preferred to the rest.

[ ] While we illustrated the Acts of S. Bertin the abbot at the V day of this month, we briefly touched upon not a few things pertaining to the Life of S. Audomarus The Life of S. Audomarus written by an almost contemporary writer: and to his history, and also elucidated some things more at length, because they were connected with the Acts of S. Bertin. Those things therefore which were sufficiently discussed there we shall not here subject to a fresh examination, but shall only briefly assign them. Of the Life of S. Audomarus published by Mabillon in the Acts of the Benedictine Saints, cent. 2, pag. 559, I treated there in the preliminary Commentary, §2; and I showed that it was not written by a contemporary author, but perhaps a whole century or even longer after the death of holy Audomarus, namely in the VIII century after the middle, or at any rate before the middle of the IX century: I added however that no other faults appear in it, except that the Saint's deeds are not narrated clearly enough, nor all of them. In the same Commentary, num. 82, I observed that that Life is accused by someone as though it were interpolated: but I showed that this was said by error, and without any foundation; since it has no indications of interpolation; and since it was published by Mabillon from the Corbie transcript as pure, and in our manuscript codex, which is very ancient, it is found in the same manner without any notable change, as will be plain below, where we shall publish this Life in the first place, and shall compare our manuscript with Mabillon's edition.

[2] With this Life of S. Audomarus, which is by far more ancient and better than all the rest, the same in the Cambrai Ms. lightly interpolated, and enlarged at the end. certain others so agree that they contain all the facts which are narrated in this; but they have also other circumstances, especially miracles wrought after the Saint's death. Such above the rest is that of which I have a transcript from the Cambrai codex, marked with this title: The Life of S. Audomarus bishop and confessor, extracted from a manuscript parchment codex of the metropolitan church of Cambrai, which seems to be of the XII century after the middle. For I find there no facts which are not read in the first Life, except some miracles added at the end: yet in one place I see the order changed, as I shall observe in the Annotations. Besides, certain words are not rarely different, and a very few are also from time to time added, so that this Life may be called the first interpolated and enlarged at the end. Wherefore from this Ms. I shall note upon the first Life only those things which shall seem worthy of note: for the miracles which are read at the end of this will be given in another later one, as I shall observe upon it.

[3] Another Life different from the first; yet composed from it: The third Life of S. Audomarus differs much more from the first, yet in such a way that its writer too saw the first, but was less willing to follow it: for he omits many facts, namely all those things which Audomarus did with S. Bertin and his companions, so that Bertin is not even named in

this Life, except at the burial of Audomarus. On the other hand some notable fact, besides other minutiae, has been added in this Life. It likewise contains at the end the miracles which are in the Cambrai codex. Further, of this Life I have four transcripts. The first, from a manuscript codex of the monastery of Anchin, our Chifflet formerly transmitted to my predecessors. The second our Papebroch transcribed with his own hand from a certain Cistercian codex. The third and fourth I received through a friend of Saint-Omer, the one from a codex of the library of the Feuillants at Paris, the other from a codex of the Bertinian library. That Life has something by which it may at first sight be believed to be by a contemporary writer, and that must be weighed for this reason too, that in all the transcripts it is noted in the margin.

[4] [it has indeed a certain saying as of a contemporary author: nevertheless it is not by a contemporary writer,] Where the author of the first Life at num. 15 narrates that at the death of S. Audomarus a sweet odor was perceived, he alleges the testimony of those who had been present at his dying, in these words: But those who at that same hour were present in that house testified etc. From this passage it does not follow that that writer was contemporary, as I observed in S. Bertin, because the author does not say that those who had been present testified it to himself. But the author of the third Life, of which we now treat, speaks thus of the same matter: And they testified TO US, who were present at that time etc. But that to us seems to prove that the author of that Life lived with those who had been present at Audomarus' dying. I willingly confess that this seems to be suggested by the word to us; and I should altogether so judge, if the falsity of that opinion did not appear more clearly from elsewhere. But I cannot doubt that the writer of that Life is some centuries later than S. Audomarus, both because he reports various miracles wrought long after the Saint's death, and because in the epilogue he speaks thus: These things concerning the manner of life and the virtues of the most holy prelate Audomarus we have touched upon in a brief discourse. For the rest, let the reader know that a very great forest of his virtues lies hidden from us, which partly the negligence of earlier writers, and some things the judgment of moderns has passed over in silence, on account of the weariness of readers. These words altogether prove that the writer wrote after certain others about S. Audomarus, and that he is some centuries later than he.

[5] But, someone will say, the later miracles with the epilogue of the Life were added by an interpolator. I answer that this is said without any foundation: [but probably by that anonymous writer who wrote about the beginning of the 10th century:] for the author himself in the epilogue attributes everything to himself. If we were to proceed by conjectures, I should believe that no other could more probably be called the author of this Life than that anonymous writer of Sithiu who composed the Life of S. Bertin published by us in the second place. Certainly his meager style agrees with the style of this Life; and it is credible enough that he wished to write of S. Audomarus, although another Life of that Saint already existed, just as he wrote of S. Bertin after another. Besides, thus it can easily be understood why the deeds of S. Audomarus with S. Bertin are omitted: for since that anonymous writer had narrated them in the Life of S. Bertin, he could have believed that it was not necessary to repeat the same things in the Life of S. Audomarus. But another who had not written the Life of S. Bertin could not use that reasoning. Further, that that anonymous writer wrote about the beginning of the X century, I said in Bertin, num. 17. Mabillon from Surius suspected that the first Life of S. Audomarus was abridged by Folcard and interpolated; but he speaks of the Life of Audomarus published in Surius, which is different from this, because the deeds of S. Audomarus with Bertin are related there, but here omitted. Wherefore neither does he himself set down Folcard as the author or interpolator of the Life to be published by us in the second place, nor do I judge that this can probably be attributed to Folcard, because that writer has a more florid style, or, if you prefer, a swollen one, and changed more things in the Life of S. Bertin than have been changed in this Life of Audomarus; which suits excellently the anonymous writer already named, who wrote in the same manner about Bertin.

[6] But whoever was the author of this Life, whether that anonymous writer, this however to be published in the second place: the Life published by Surius: as seems likely to me, or some other, he was far later than S. Audomarus, and must be of far less authority than the writer of the first Life, whenever they disagree. Nor ought the words given above, And they testified to us, to stand in the way of this judgment; because those words cannot be so understood that that biographer must be reckoned to have lived with those who had been present at Audomarus' dying. For perhaps he found those words written by some contemporary about the death of S. Audomarus, and adopted them without change, as some less accurate writers do. Perhaps by the word to us he meant the monks of his own monastery to be designated. For whatever cause at length he wrote thus, the author indicates by no other sign that he is contemporary, and wrote much more meagerly about S. Audomarus than a contemporary writer would have done. This Life however I shall publish in the second place, that the learned readers themselves may be able to judge of it. But the Acts published in Surius I shall not transfer hither, since they contain nothing of great moment which is not read in the first or second Life. This only I observe, that it does not seem to have been written by Folcard the monk, to whom Surius and others attribute it: for I have observed that certain things are contained in that Life which are not conformable enough to what was written by Folcard in the Life of S. Bertin.

[7] Lest however anyone should be able to miss anything of the deeds of S. Audomarus, a third and more prolix Life also to be given: I shall give also a third Life, more prolix than the preceding, in which are read various facts omitted in the earlier ones, or at any rate not related in them. This Life we have in our manuscript codex which contains the Lives of the Saints of the month of September, and is marked among us P. Ms. 158. That author seems to have written in the XII or XIII century: he adopted all that is read in the older writers, and joined to them other facts, which he partly found in other monuments, and partly perhaps drew from report and popular tradition. This Life is fuller than the preceding ones, but the facts added to it are less certain than those which are read in the first Life: most of them however are at least probable. Various things too toward the end about the translations of the body and about more recent miracles this author has, which are later than the first biographer. Further, besides the codex in which this Life is contained, I have two other transcripts of the same, received, I think, at Saint-Omer, which I shall compare with the codex.

[8] the other chief writers who formerly treated of the Saint. Finally, besides these Lives, another summary of the Life was given by Vincent of Beauvais in the Speculum Historiale, book 23, chaps. 108 and 109; another again by Peter de Natalibus in the Catalogue of the Saints, book 8, chap. 58; but these bring forward nothing which is not read more fully in the Lives. Besides, many things about S. Audomarus are read in the Breviary of the church of Saint-Omer, which was printed in the year 1518; many in others, of which we have only transcripts. Nevertheless in these I find no more about Audomarus than in the third Life, in which all that is in the Breviaries seems gathered, and therefore it is not necessary to publish anything from the Breviaries, in order that the studious reader may have all that presents itself about S. Audomarus: for the things which shall occur to be said from the Chronicle of John of Ypres, or from other histories, will be sifted in this preliminary Commentary, where it shall seem worth the trouble.

§ II. The Saint's deeds recalled to some kind of chronological order and examined.

[ ] The Saint born of noble family near Constance: That S. Audomarus was born toward the end of the VI century or about the beginning of the VII, is gathered from what we shall say below about the beginning of his monastic life under abbot Eustasius, and about the beginning of his episcopate in the reign of Dagobert. But the very year of his birth cannot be fixed for certain from these, nor has it become known from elsewhere. His birthplace, Aurea-Vallis near Constance in Germany, is clearly asserted in the Lives. The common name of the place is added by John of Ypres in Edmond Martène, tom. 3 of the Thesaurus Anecdotorum, col. 449, where it is written Guldindal; but now it would be called Gulden-dal, which is the same in Dutch as Aurea-Vallis, the Golden Valley. That S. Audomarus was sprung of noble parents the biographers agree, nor do we doubt of that matter. But we do not believe so certain what John of Ypres added to the Lives about the consanguinity of SS. Audomarus and Bertin, and about their common descent with the dukes of France and the kings of the second stock. Since however John of Ypres' opinion pleased Malbrancq and Le Cointe, I shall transfer hither the praised writer's words.

[10] the assertions of John of Ypres about the genealogy of SS. Audomarus and Bertin, In Martène, col. 449, he has thus: In the same part of the region also, and particularly in the place which is called Aurea-vallis, but commonly Guldindal, was born blessed Audomarus, both of them sprung of the same stock, namely of the race of the kings and dukes of the Austrasians, the Lotharingians and the Brabanters — that is, of the great Arnulf, and of saint Arnulf, Ansegisus, Pippin the greater and the lesser, Charles Martel, and Charlemagne — as the same Charlemagne testifies in a certain Privilege, in which, naming the Saint himself, he says: And since that same Saint is recognized to have been of our race etc. At col. [ ] he again speaks of these things thus: There was then (under Clothar II) as mayor of the palace Pippin the son of Karloman, with whom in administering the commonwealth there cooperated saint Arnulf, the son of Arnold, the son of Ansbert by Blitildis the daughter of king Clothar the first. This is the noble stock of the blessed confessors of Christ Audomarus and Bertin: for from the race of that Ansbert they proceeded (who was a senator of the Austrasians), to whom the king thought fit to join his daughter in marriage. He by Blitildis the king's daughter begot Arnold, a duke so magnificent that the sons of kings and princes were sent to his care to be instructed in every kind of nobility, in arms and in manners. Arnold had a son, saint Arnulf, who was mayor of the palace with Pippin under this king Clothar, and afterward bishop of Metz: he had sons Ansegisus etc. If this is truly the genealogy of S. Audomarus, which the author weaves down to Charlemagne, S. Audomarus will have been a kinsman of S. Arnulf in the second or third degree, and of Charlemagne in the seventh degree.

[11] Malbrancq, book 3 On the Morini, chap. 1, arranges the whole genealogy, with which Malbrancq agrees, are not only uncertain, and prefers to derive the maternal descent of S. Audomarus from Ansbert and Blitildis rather than the paternal: for he makes Ansbert the grandfather of Domitta and of S. Arnulf. I would not deny that everything could have happened as it is arranged in Malbrancq after the mind of John of Ypres. But neither are Malbrancq's conjectures so likely or so firm, nor is the authority of John of Ypres in ancient matters so solid,

that I should judge anything certain can be laid down about the family of S. Audomarus. For the whole proof of John of Ypres seems to be reduced to some diploma of Charlemagne, who is said in it to acknowledge that S. Audomarus was of his own race. But we do not know whether that diploma is genuine, or falsified, or even supposititious. We do not know whether Charlemagne's diploma clearly has what John of Ypres attributes to it; whether it was rightly understood by John of Ypres; whether what he explained of Audomarus was said of Audomarus. We do not know whence he drew what he affirms about the consanguinity of Audomarus and Bertin with Ansbert, S. Arnulf, and the other progenitors of Charlemagne: for Audomarus could have been Charles' kinsman because Charles' mother was of the same race as S. Audomarus. It cannot therefore be deduced from Charles' words that Audomarus sprang from Charlemagne's paternal race, much less from Ansbert.

[12] For these causes we suspect that John of Ypres deduced many things from conjectures alone: but are also not probable enough. and since in his conjectures he was not everywhere happy enough, we hold that whole genealogy for uncertain, not to say improbable. For I do not understand why all the writers of the Lives of S. Audomarus and S. Bertin did not so much as hint anything about these matters, especially since some of them seem to have flourished in the time of Charlemagne. I do not see why that diploma of Charles became known to John of Ypres alone, and to none of the earlier writers, who would not have been silent about so illustrious a family of the Saints, had they known it. To all these is added the silence also of all the other ancients: for many others could have made mention of these things, if they were true; and yet I find nothing written about that family of S. Audomarus before the times of John of Ypres. And so I believe it altogether uncertain whether Audomarus was of Charlemagne's race; nor do I add more about these things, because they do not seem probable enough.

[13] Audomarus, brought up in his father's house, together with his father Friulf embraced the monastic life in the abbey of Luxeuil, when S. Eustasius, the successor of S. Columbanus, presided over it, as is read in the Lives. He embraced the monastic life under abbot Eustasius, not under Columbanus, But Le Cointe in the Annals of the Franks at the year 608, num. 2, judges that Audomarus was already made a monk about that year under S. Columbanus. For that opinion he praises the Life of S. Agilus the abbot, published by us at the XXX of August, in which at num. 5 this is read: And so Agilus, entering upon the age of boyhood, is committed to Eustasius to be instructed in sacred letters together with other sons of noble men, who afterward became prelates of churches — namely Agnoald and Waldebert, … Acharius, who was bishop of Vermandois, of Noyon and of Tournai, Rachnacharius, who shone as an excellent pontiff of the church of Autun, Audomarus, who flourished as a praiseworthy pastor of Boulogne and of the town of Thérouanne. But from this passage he forms such an argument as this: Agilus and the others who are here recounted were delivered to S. Eustasius by S. Columbanus to be instructed. Therefore Audomarus too entered under S. Columbanus.

[14] as Le Cointe will have it, whose reasoning is refuted: I answer that that writer recounted the chief disciples of S. Eustasius with whom Agilus associated at Luxeuil; but by no means says that they were all disciples of Eustasius in the time of Columbanus. The four chief ones are also recounted in the Life of S. Eustasius, written by the contemporary Jonas and given by us at the XXIX of March, num. 7. But there they are not said to have been committed to Eustasius by Columbanus, but to have been instructed by him when he was already abbot, and afterward promoted to the episcopate. Audomarus is there too recorded last, in these words: Audomarus was bishop of Boulogne, of the town of Thérouanne. So Le Cointe ought to have explained the passage even in his own opinion, since Agilus was made a monk very many years before Audomarus. Wherefore, when the former was delivered by Columbanus to Eustasius to be taught, the others, and especially Audomarus, were not yet at Luxeuil. Nothing therefore can be drawn about the time of S. Audomarus' entrance from the fact that he was a fellow-disciple of S. Agilus, or of the others, since all these remained disciples under abbot Eustasius, and some even under his successor, until each was promoted to some dignity. For this cause we say with the Lives that S. Audomarus was made a monk under S. Eustasius, but in some uncertain year, perhaps about the year 612 or 615, perhaps even later.

[15] he was made bishop not after the year 637, That the Saint remained not a few years at Luxeuil before he was promoted to the episcopate, the Life has at num. 5, where at the same time it teaches that he was created bishop in the time of king Dagobert, who according to the more probable opinion died in the year 638, and that in the month of January. Le Cointe at the year 637, num. 6, says that Audomarus was created bishop at the end of the year 637, which is not contrary to the Life, but is in no way certain, since the reasoning drawn from the thirty years of his episcopate and from the year of his death, which he sets at 668, does not hold: for we shall show both that Audomarus sat later, and that he administered the episcopate for more years. Nevertheless either the reasoning or the authority of Le Cointe brought it about, as I judge, that both Mabillon in the Benedictine Annals and Longueval in the History of the Gallican church refer the beginning of S. Audomarus' episcopate to the same year. But Baillet at the IX of September, in his account of Audomarus, preferred to refer the beginning of the episcopate to the end of the year 636, but with no reason for his chronology alleged. This is certain, that the beginning of Audomarus' episcopate cannot be placed later than I have said it is placed by Le Cointe and others; but it is equally certain that he could have been bishop some years earlier.

[16] Malbrancq, book 3 On the Morini, chap. XI, and then in the Scholium on the same chapter, judges nor before 628; but in an uncertain year under Dagobert. that Audomarus was created bishop from the year 624, and that two years afterward S. Bertin came to him with his companions. In these things he followed John of Ypres, who hands down the same about Bertin's coming in his Chronicle, chap. 1, parts 5 and 6. But this opinion altogether displeases, because Audomarus does not seem to have been made bishop before the death of Clothar II, who died in the year 628, since no mention of Clothar is made in the Life; but the promotion of Audomarus is so attributed to Dagobert that he seems then to have reigned alone: for Audomarus is said to have been called to the episcopate not only by Dagobert, but also by the whole people of the Franks: by which it is hinted that all the Franks then obeyed Dagobert. And so the beginning of the episcopate must necessarily be fixed between the year 628 and 638, that is under the monarchy of Dagobert. But since in the Saint's promotion only king Dagobert and Acharius bishop of Noyon are named, who was sitting already before the monarchy of Dagobert, and is believed to have survived him, no suitable reason occurs why Audomarus should have been created bishop rather in the year 637 than about the year 630 or 634: for Le Cointe's reasoning, drawn from the years of his episcopate, avails nothing for this, since those years are uncertain, as we shall show.

§ III. Whether S. Audomarus is the first bishop of the Morini.

[ ] Audomarus, as is hinted in the Life, seems the first bishop of the Morini: It can here be asked whether S. Audomarus was the first bishop of the Morini, that is of Thérouanne and Boulogne, as his Life altogether suggests. For Malbrancq in his Work On the Morini, book 2, brings forward two bishops of the Morini before Audomarus, namely Antimundus or Aumondus, and Athalbert, whom likewise the Sainte-Marthes placed before Audomarus, following Malbrancq. Malbrancq however was not the first to give Antimundus and Athalbert to the Morini as bishops; but he praises as the patron of this opinion Matthieu Desprets in the Chronicle of the Morini, which I have not at hand. But I have inquired the more diligently whether those two bishops of the Morini rested on firm foundations; but I could find nothing in Malbrancq or elsewhere by which I might firmly establish their episcopate. On the contrary not a few things occur from which the whole matter becomes highly suspect: for I see many conjectures lightly brought forward, and those little probable; ancient monuments either few or none, of whose truth there is no room for doubt.

[18] Antimundus, in book 2, chap. 39, he says was a solitary in the territory of Reims, for Antimundus and Athalbert, whom some would have sat in the VI century, and thence was called out by S. Remigius and consecrated bishop, that he might convert the Morini; and that Antimundus was not his first name, but that he was called by that name by Remigius, that he might lay the world low (mundum prosterneret). The same author in chap. 43 brings Antimundus, who is said to have been created bishop of the Morini, into Switzerland, that he may there find the bodies of SS. Victor and Ursus the martyrs, whose finding is to be referred to the beginning of the VII century, whereas Antimundus by Malbrancq's reckoning was bishop a whole century earlier. As this is not even probable, so those things which he reports about a monastery founded, and all that he afterward pursues about Athalbert, are at the least uncertain. I would not however deny that Antimundus and Athalbert were among the Morini, and labored for their conversion, if anyone could prove it by suitable monuments; but that they were the first bishops of the Morini in the VI century I shall not hold for certain, unless it be proved by far better reasons than those I find adduced in Malbrancq. He adduces indeed in chap. 44 a letter of king Clothar to Athalbert, and in chap. 46 a letter of Pope John II to the same, and finally in chap. 49 certain verses of Venantius Fortunatus about Athalbert. But neither does the first letter seem to suit Clothar, nor the second Pope John, nor could I find the praised verses in Fortunatus.

[19] more probably were not bishops of the Morini: Now if we consider the reasons which can be opposed to monuments so suspect, produced from the Chronicle of the Morini, we shall easily see that the episcopate of those two is not very likely. If we believe Malbrancq, they sat from the year 500 to 552. Various councils were held in the Gauls at that time; neither is read as subscribed to any council. Neither S. Gregory of Tours nor any ancient writer is known to have mentioned either of them. Nothing in the Life of S. Remigius, who would have erected the bishopric; nothing in the Life of S. Radegund, who is said to have been committed to Athalbert's care, and to have buried him; nothing in the Life of S. Vedast, who would have lived with both; nothing finally in any monument worthy of credit in these matters could I find about Antimundus or Athalbert as the first bishops of the Morini in the VI century. I should prefer therefore to believe the Life of S. Audomarus, with which the remaining monuments of Saint-Omer agree, clearly indicating that there were no bishops of the Morini at that time; especially since the district of the Morini in the VI century was under the Catholic kings of the Franks, so that there was no hindrance to others being substituted for those first bishops, if they had really sat.

[20] but as to what Hincmar says about the see of Boulogne before that of Laon, Ægidius Bucherius in Belgium Romanum, book

8, chap. 15, contends by another argument that the bishopric of Boulogne was erected long before Audomarus, not in the VI century but in the IV. The authority of Hincmar bishop of Reims, who flourished in the IX century, persuaded the learned man of this, and not altogether undeservedly. For Hincmar in his little Work to Hincmar of Laon, chap. 1, writes thus: For Arras, Vermandois, and Boulogne, from whose territory thou art a native, existed as older sees with their own bishops in the province of Reims, before the castle of Mont-Laon was reckoned among the sees, in which thou hast been ordained bishop. But since for a long time, certain causes of events and of necessities occurring — as we read also of several cities in certain provinces — those, being made subject to other cities, lost their privilege etc. Hence Bucherius observes that the bishop of Boulogne is said by Hincmar to be older than that of Laon, whom however, he says, S. Remigius established about the year of Christ D. So that it must be that under the Romans too, and even under Constantine himself or his sons, Boulogne was an episcopal see: nor without reason did the register of the provinces and cities of Gaul reckon separately, beyond Thérouanne the capital of the Morini, that of Boulogne also: for no place was properly called a city unless it was episcopal. I confess that this whole argument is probably drawn.

[21] But I doubt whether so much is to be attributed to Hincmar that his authority can suffice to remove every doubt. Certainly throughout that whole little Work Hincmar vehemently presses his own case against Hincmar of Laon, nor is it so certain or resting on so firm a foundation, and wonderfully extols the authority of the church of Reims, but depresses the honors of the see of Laon as much as he can. If therefore anyone should suspect that in the heat of disputation some things escaped Hincmar which do not altogether agree with exact truth, he would not be bringing forward a suspicion destitute of all foundation. Hincmar found bishops of Boulogne in the VII century, as well as those of Thérouanne or of the Morini; he could thence have judged that they were far more ancient, but had afterward ceased, because Boulogne had been made subject to the bishop of Thérouanne. Certainly he reckons Boulogne among those cities which were afterward made subject to others. But that subjection seems later than S. Audomarus, who was bishop of Thérouanne and of Boulogne at once. Hincmar therefore seems to speak rightly of Boulogne to this extent, that it once had its own bishop; but there is a strong suspicion that he asserts without suitable foundation that that of Boulogne is older than that of Laon.

[22] A weighty reason indeed compels us to believe that neither in the IV nor in the V or VI century was there any bishop of Boulogne. so that the contrary reasons do not outweigh it. S. Victricius bishop of Rouen promulgated the faith among the Morini about the end of the IV century, as is established from letter 18 of S. Paulinus written to him; nor do I see why Victricius should have preached there if they then had their own bishop. But if at the end of the IV century they did not have a bishop, it is not likely that any episcopal see was fixed there in that century: for if the Morini had had their own bishop in the IV century, they would probably have continued to have one, and Victricius would have found more Christians there than the letter of Paulinus suggests were found by him. There is added the silence of all writers about bishops of the Morini before S. Audomarus, whereby we believe that they did not exist in the V or VI century either. And so we willingly acknowledge that the faith was preached to the Morini from the III century by SS. Fuscianus and Victoricus, and in the following centuries from time to time by others; but we do not judge that there was any proper bishop of the Morini before S. Audomarus. Hence likewise we believe that very few Christians were found in the district of the Morini by Audomarus, especially since that province in the V century had been laid waste by the Vandals and afterward occupied by the Franks, then pagans: for thus the seeds of faith cast there could not grow.

§ IV. The deeds done by Audomarus in his episcopate arranged in some fashion: the time of his death uncertain.

[ ] That S. Audomarus had some companions when, adorned with the episcopal dignity, he first came to the Morini, S. Audomarus, coming to the Morini, did not have S. Agilus as a companion, we readily believe, whether they accompanied him from the monastery of Luxeuil, or joined themselves to him elsewhere, or were granted to S. Audomarus by S. Acharius of Noyon or by S. Autbert of Cambrai, or had already before him been destined for the Morini. But I should not readily believe that among these first helpers of S. Audomarus was S. Agilus abbot of Rebais, whom Malbrancq judges to have been added to Audomarus, book 3, chap. 6, because S. Agilus undertook other expeditions of that kind with S. Eustasius. For that conjecture cannot be reconciled with the other deeds of S. Agilus, who was elected abbot in the year 636, and before this election labored especially in the Lord's vineyard among the people of Metz, of Langres and of Besançon, as may be read in his Life, given and illustrated at the XXX of August. And so, since Audomarus was created bishop either some years before, or in nearly the same year in which Agilus was made abbot, he does not seem to have had him among his first companions.

[24] [he converts Adroald, founds a church at Sithiu: receives Bertin with his companions:] The first care of the holy Prelate was occupied in converting pagans, in gathering and instructing Christians, if he found any among the Morini, as is likely; in erecting churches at Thérouanne and Boulogne for the administration of the sacred rites. Among the nobles who were converted by him in his first years from the superstition of the gentiles was Adroald, a man of outstanding riches and power. He at once began to help Audomarus with his wealth, as is read in the Life, num. 12; and offered him the farm of Sithiu. And the Saint presently built there a church, or at least a chapel, and probably set over it a presbyter, who should administer the sacred rites to the Christians dwelling in that tract, and should strive to convert the gentiles. Some have placed there not only a presbyter, but also several clerics, as though it had been a collegiate church. But the arguments which they have brought forward are of no moment. Further, the year in which these things happened has not become known; but all could have taken place about the year 634, if Audomarus was already bishop about 630 or 632; or about 636 or 638, if he was created bishop some years later. Then perhaps a year or two afterward there came to Audomarus SS. Mummolinus, Bertin and Ebertramnus, to whom likewise he assigned a place among the possessions received from Adroald for founding a monastery, as was said in S. Bertin at the V of September. I suspect that they were invited by the Saint to erect a monastery among the Morini, so that he might thus more quickly accomplish the conversion of the Morini and make it more stable.

[25] He ordains S. Wandregisilus a presbyter: While they were living in that first monastery, which they afterward called the old monastery, and were diligently working with S. Audomarus for the conversion of the gentiles, the fame of the holy Bishop became gradually more famous, as may be gathered even from one fact, which is generally attached to the year 646. S. Wandregisilus, afterward the first abbot of Fontenelle in Normandy, had come to Rouen to S. Audoënus the bishop of that city. Him S. Audoënus initiated in the sacred orders, and consecrated him deacon; but he wished him to be consecrated presbyter by Audomarus. Both Lives of S. Wandregisilus, given by us at the XXII of July, testify to this. The first indeed at num. 19 in these words: Then (Audoënus) caused (Wandregisilus) to ascend to the priesthood through the hands of the lord Audomarus. But the second at num. 13 has thus: Not long after he was consecrated to the priesthood, though refusing, by the command of the same most blessed prelate Audoënus, by the venerable Audomarus pontiff of the city of Thérouanne. I judge that this honor was conferred on Audomarus on account of his exceptional sanctity, because S. Audoënus did not lack nearer bishops, and among them was his greatest friend Eligius of Noyon, if he wished at all to confer on another the honor of consecrating the holy man.

[26] He sets Mummolinus over the monastery of Sithiu as abbot: In the year 648 the monastery of Sithiu was founded, at Audomarus' urging, and with his willing permission that Adroald should confer the goods offered or delivered to him for this end, by a perpetual donation, upon SS. Mummolinus, Bertin and Ebertramnus, to whom others had already then been added, as I judge. These things may be seen more at large discussed in S. Bertin, §§5 and 6, where I also showed that the first abbot of that monastery appointed by Audomarus was S. Mummolinus, whom S. Bertin afterward succeeded, when Mummolinus was promoted to the bishopric of Noyon. Malbrancq, book 3, chap. 20, and Le Cointe at the year 648, num. 38, likewise attach to the same year the notable offices of charity which S. Audomarus rendered to S. Austreberta the virgin. The same chronology is followed by Mabillon in the Benedictine Annals, tom. 1, pag. 469, and Pagi at the year 695, num. 5: for both assert that Austreberta was made abbess of Pavilly about the year 662, after she had spent fourteen years in the monastery of Port on the Somme, where she first began the monastic Life.

[27] Our Bolland treated of S. Austreberta at the X of February, about the year 655 or 656, and there in the preliminary Commentary laid down some things about the chronology of the Life of S. Audomarus from the Life given by Surius. But we think that that is no longer to be followed, just as neither is the epoch of the reign of Dagobert, long since changed. But I judge that what he there laid down about the time of the veil received by Austreberta is not equally to be abandoned, which he judges to have happened about the year 655 or 656. I would not indeed contend that this opinion is altogether certain. But it appears at least far more probable than is the opinion of others. The time of the veiling becomes known from the time at which the Saint was called out by S. Filibert the abbot to the monastery of Pavilly, since it is established on both sides that the veiling preceded by fourteen years. And it is likely that Austreberta was called out not many years before the imprisonment and exile of S. Filibert, since the writer of the Life of S. Filibert interposes almost nothing between the building of the monastery of Pavilly and the imprisonment of S. Filibert, as may be seen in our work at the XX of August, where the Life is given. And so, since Filibert's exile is generally attached to the year 674, the calling out of S. Austreberta is probably fixed about the year 669 or 670.

[28] On the contrary it cannot be fixed with sufficient probability about the year 662, not in the year 648, as is proved, as I shall easily show. S. Filibert received the place for founding the monastery of Jumièges not long before the death of Clovis II in the year 655 or 656. Then he prepared the place, and built an ample monastery. But that work does not seem to have been completed in one year or two, especially since Filibert was far away, being abbot of Rebais in Brie. Then, when the monastery of Jumièges had been built, that of Pavilly was not immediately begun: for the biographer of S. Filibert interposes not a few other things between the building of the two monasteries, and in the Life, num. 16, expressly says: When therefore the multitude of men had increased in the monastery (of Jumièges), he built another monastery, by name Pavilly. Some years therefore between the building of the two monasteries

intervened. Finally some time too must be allowed for the building of this monastery: for Austreberta was only called out when it was already inhabited, as is clear from her Life, chap. 3. No prudent man will be able to judge that all these things were accomplished in six years. I certainly should prefer to believe that twelve or fourteen years could easily have been spent upon them; and thus I arrive at the time assigned by Bolland.

[29] And so about 655 or 656 are probably fixed the things which the Life of S. Austreberta reports about her flight to S. Audomarus. The cause of her fleeing was that her parents wished to bind Austreberta in marriage against her will. He veils S. Austreberta and reconciles her to her parents. God is said to have helped her as she fled by a miracle, as may be seen in her Life, where the things pertaining to Audomarus are reported thus: There was in these times a holy man, of great merit with God, Audomarus by name, pontiff of the city of Thérouanne, in whose diocese the noble maiden had drawn her origin. To him she then hastened, to be consecrated with the sacred veil… And the river being crossed, hastening as fast as possible, they come to the Man of God, and the maiden, cast down at his feet, obtained what she desired: for she was consecrated to Christ, and, having received the veil, her soul clung after him, and the right hand of Christ received her… But the Man of God, when he had learned that her parents were disturbed by this matter, taking with him the handmaid of God, took care to visit them for the sake of consoling them, and soothed their agitated minds with peaceful words, and, rendering them gentle and mild, recalled them to their former charity. The father embraces his daughter, the brothers their sister, and each kisses her, glorifying God in common. For it was brought about by divine dispensation that they who before had despised her in mockery afterward venerated her with the highest devotion. Then the author adds how she was led by her own people to the monastery of Port. Thus far of this fact, whose epoch I have illustrated the more carefully, because it pertains at the same time to S. Austreberta.

[30] He gives the church of B. Mary to the men of Sithiu: Then S. Audomarus, together with S. Bertin, who seems to have had the chief part in these matters, began to build a monastery and a church of S. Mary the virgin, where he wished to be buried with the monks of Sithiu, and where after his death he really was buried. For he gave that church with the monastery to S. Bertin and his monks. And the donation was made in the VI year of Clothar III, that is in the year 661 or 662. The letters of the donation themselves may be seen in S. Bertin, §6, and our judgment about the letters and the subscriptions there in §7. One thing only I here observe, that in those letters that basilica is said to have been completed by a common work through SS. Audomarus and Bertin. But hence, and from the donation itself too, is gathered, or at any rate confirmed, that very thing which is asserted in the first Life, num. 12, namely that some church had before been built in the same place by Audomarus: for if Audomarus had helped S. Bertin only with money, who seems chiefly to have erected the later buildings, the donation would not have been so necessary, nor would the place properly have been built by a common work; but everything is best understood if Audomarus built a church there before, and Bertin afterward added the rest. Further, I am not unaware that in a certain recent pamphlet, which was published in the name of the Chapter of Saint-Omer against the Bertinians, most of what is here said is denied. But in the Annotations upon the several texts of the Lives which they allege, I shall refute that opinion.

[31] at that time he more probably was not blind. Further, from the subscriptions of the letters of S. Audomarus just praised, if they are genuine, it will also rightly be gathered that the Saint was blind in the year 662. For such a subscription is read there: In the name of Christ, though a sinner, I Audomarus by name, without merit a bishop, dictated this letter of my own will and heard it read over, and asked those who should write below to do so. These things I did without eyes, and another, holding my hand, wrote and subscribed. Mabillon, book 2 De Re diplomatica, chap. 20, and again chap. 22, alleges this subscription as suitable to his purpose. The former passage I gave in Bertin. But at chap. 22, num. 4, he has thus: So saint Audomarus bishop of the Morini, when toward the end of his life he had fallen into blindness, thus subscribes his testament: These things I did without eyes etc. I willingly confess therefore that the subscriptions of the letters of S. Audomarus, which are wrongly called a testament, could have been approved by Mabillon, and were approved. But I myself have not dared to approve them in S. Bertin, where in §8 I set forth various difficulties by which those subscriptions, if not invented, are certainly rendered strongly suspect. Wherefore, although the blindness of S. Audomarus is certain, I judge it not only uncertain, but even less probable, that he was already blind in the year 662; since in Bertin I have shown that his blindness probably befell him some years later. See what is to be noted on chapter 2 of the first Life, lit. g.

[32] In the following year, that is the seventh of Clothar, and of the Christian era 662 or 663, bishop Bertefrid is read to have given some privilege to the abbey of Corbie, [The letters of Bertefrid addressed to the Saint: at the translation of S. Vedast,] and to have addressed it to various bishops, among whom is S. Audomarus, who nevertheless is not found among the subscribers. The whole privilege may be read in Le Cointe at the year 662, num. 20, where also are recounted the difficulties objected to it, which do not belong to my purpose. Toward the end of his life, when Audomarus was blind, he was present at the translation of the body of S. Vedast bishop of Cambrai. About the time of that translation the writers do not agree. Mabillon, tom. 1, pag. 483, places it about the year 666, as also Le Cointe in the same place, num. 1. Our Henschen in S. Vedast, tom. 1 of February, pag. 791, sets down the year 667. Others judge that the translation happened much later or earlier: for John of Ypres in his Chronicle, chap. 1, part 12, defers the translation to the year 680. But Martène the editor writes in his Annotations that it was made in the year 658, unless it be a misprint. Finally, to pass over others, the third Life at num. 21 has that the translation happened in the year 694.

[33] I scarcely doubt that Henschen's opinion is of all the nearest to the truth, at which, about the year 667, the blind Audomarus is present, nor yet do I call it altogether certain, since it could have happened a year or two earlier or later. For Henschen places the death of S. Vedast about the year 540, but some two years earlier. And the body is said to have remained in the place of burial, as he also observes, about one hundred and twenty-eight years. And the translation was made on the Kalends of October. Wherefore if the Saint died in the very year 540, on the VI of February, and those 128 years were not completed, as is hinted, Henschen's reckoning is exactly right; but if they were completed, the translation happened in the year 668, provided the death fell in the year 540. Now whatever it be about the one year or the other of the translation, Alcuin in the Life of S. Vedast, given by us, chap. 5, relates that S. Autbert was admonished by a divine vision about the place to which the body of S. Vedast was to be translated. Then he adds this: Made more certain by which revelation, he invited to so great a work B. Audomarus, who at that season was held as magnificent in the things of God, bishop of Thérouanne the city of the Morini. Who, although already pressed by age, and seeming to have been made weaker by the loss of his sight, yet having his mind like a bow bent with spiritual zeal, at once ready, with Christ guiding his steps, came in haste to the venerable Autbert. And he, relating what he bore in mind, and what had been divinely shown him, with equal desire and common counsel, with great joy of the peoples who had flocked together from every side, they translated the most blessed Vedast to the appointed place.

[34] he divinely obtains his sight: but by prayers obtains that his blindness return: In which translation B. Audomarus is reported to have recovered the light of his eyes, but at once by prayers to have obtained again the same blindness which he had borne willingly. For he made little of the light of fleshly eyes, who deserved the light of the citizens above. The same translation is narrated in the Life of S. Autbert by Fulbert, who, agreeing about the rest also, speaks thus of the sight recovered by S. Audomarus: When they were now touching the suburban bounds (in the translation), and B. Audomarus was following S. Autbert's steps little by little, at once he recognized in himself the power of the working from above; so that it might be openly given him to understand of how great merit were both he who was borne, and he whom by bearing he followed. For, the night of long blindness being driven away, he at once receives the light of his eyes, namely in the place where a church built in memory of B. Autbert is still seen by those present in memory of the present miracle. But because the venerable man Audomarus made little of the light of fleshly eyes, since he assuredly desired the light of the citizens above, at once by prayers he obtained again the same blindness which he had borne willingly. The same things about the sight recovered by Audomarus, and about the blindness obtained again by prayers, are had by Sigebert, cited by Henschen, by the third Life at num. 20, and by John of Ypres, chap. 1, part 12. In these Baillet ought rather to have acquiesced, than to use a ridiculous explanation and say that Audomarus could have been healed if he had wished, but was unwilling to ask for healing. Whence did he learn that the Saint could have been healed, if he was not healed?

[35] those who are said by some to have been coadjutors to Audomarus are successors. The praised John of Ypres, who wrongly prolonged the life of S. Audomarus to the year 695, adds this to what precedes: On account of this hindrance of bodily blindness there were given to B. Audomarus as coadjutors successively Draricius (otherwise Drantius), Baynus and Ravengerus. But these were rather successors of S. Audomarus than coadjutors, as I have shown in S. Bertin, num. 89. Wherefore of Drantius alone it can be doubted whether perhaps he was not a coadjutor, and afterward a successor. Further, S. Audomarus seems to have survived at least a year or two after the translation of S. Vedast: for Drausius bishop of Soissons addressed his letters, which are noted as given on the sixth of the Kalends of July, in the XIV year of the reign of Clothar, to Audomarus and other bishops, as I observed in Bertin, num. 86. The same thing Le Cointe and Pagi observed; but they did not discourse in the same manner from that epoch about the year of S. Audomarus' death.

[36] Different opinions about the year of S. Audomarus' death: Le Cointe lays down that Audomarus died in the year 668, on the V of the Ides of September, because he does not dare to attribute to him more than thirty years of episcopate, and even so nevertheless attributes to him nearly thirty-one years, since he begins his episcopate from the year 637. He likewise admits the letters of Drausius addressed to Audomarus in the 14th year of Clothar; but since at the year 655, num. 8, he would have Clovis II die at the end of the year 655, he cannot in his own reckoning have the 14th year of Clothar in the year 668, but only in the year 669; and therefore he ought not to have fixed the death of S. Audomarus before that year. Mabillon in the Annals, tom. 1, pag. 482, recites the letters of Drausius

with this epoch, the VI of the Kalends of July, in the tenth year of Clothar the most glorious king. I do not know whether the word fourteenth was omitted in Mabillon by mere error, or whether he omitted it on purpose: but since I find no reasons alleged for the omitted word or the changed epoch, I should prefer to suspect that it is the slip of a man in haste, rather than a correction applied with deliberation. Wherefore I see that no account is to be taken by me of Mabillon's opinion about the time of S. Audomarus' death, which he marks at about the year 667; and this only I observe, that the letters of Drausius ought to have been referred by him to the year 670, if he had given the epoch rightly.

[37] Pagi at the year 682, num. 10, discourses rightly of these matters. but he did not die before the year 670; For, having rejected the opinions of Le Cointe and Mabillon, he speaks thus: These words: "He ruled the church for the space of thirty years" not only are not read in the Life of S. Audomarus, and are interpolated, as Mabillon rightly observed, but are also foreign to the truth. For Audomarus subscribed to the privilege granted by Drausio bishop of Soissons to the monastery of maidens built outside the walls of Soissons, which Drausius granted them by a diploma given at Soissons, on the sixth of the Kalends of July, in the fourteenth year of the reign of Clothar the most glorious king, and therefore in the year of Christ six hundred and seventy, as we have shown in its place. The author of the Life of S. Audomarus does not record his day of death, but an interpolator affirms that he passed to Christ on the V of the Ides of September, because, namely, he saw that the ecclesiastical Office was performed on that day. But whatever it be about the day of death, since he was declared bishop of the city of Thérouanne in the reign of Dagobert, and with saint Acharius bishop of Noyon helping, as the anonymous writer says, and therefore before the death of king Dagobert — at which time Acharius had been bishop of Noyon from about the year DCXXI — it is manifest that saint Audomarus was still alive in the year six hundred and seventy; that he exchanged life for death in an uncertain year, and held the episcopate for at least XXXIII years. Thus far Pagi.

[38] But he reasons thus because he begins the reign of Clothar III after the second week of November of the year 656, but the death is to be fixed about that year: as he proves in the same place, num. 17, that it must be begun: for thus the XIV year of Clothar was necessarily running on the sixth of the Kalends of July of the year 670. Hence he also rightly says that he died in an uncertain year. Nevertheless it is likely that the holy Prelate did not long survive after the year 670, but either died in the same year, or not long after, since afterward no mention is made of him as living, and chiefly because his death is fixed in the first Life, num. 15, a few years after he contracted the blindness under which he was already laboring when about 667 the body of S. Vedast was translated. For these causes I have marked the Saint's death about the year 670. About the day of death I do not see that there is much room for doubt, because the Saints are for the most part venerated on the very day of their death, especially in the places where they lived or died, unless there be some particular reason for changing the day. That he presided over the episcopate for at least XXXIII years, at any rate incomplete, is rightly said; but if he was created bishop about the year 630, he will have administered his see for a full forty years: which is uncertain.

[39] John of Ypres, chap. 1, part 14, has this about the place of his death and his burial: the place of death and the burial. The lord saint Audomarus, after many and long labors lying on his bed in the farm of Wavrans, which is distant nearly three miles from Sithiu, having summoned his blessed comrade Bertin with his monks, his beloved sons in Christ, bidding farewell also to the Brothers, gave back his spirit to heaven. Whose body blessed Bertin devoutly gathering up, brought from Wavrans to Sithiu, with all his college accompanying, and with a throng of people and of clergy, and buried it in the chapel of the blessed Virgin, which he himself had dedicated for blessed Bertin, among the bodies of the monks, in the year DCXCV. The rest is right: but there are here two errors, the one namely in the year of death, of which we have already treated. The other is that he hints that S. Bertin was present at the dying of Audomarus: for that is repugnant to the Life, num. 15, and is asserted in no Life of S. Audomarus or of S. Bertin. For the rest, the chapel of the blessed Virgin in which the Saint's body was buried by Bertin is the present cathedral church of Saint-Omer, which was then secondary to the Bertinian abbey, as I showed in Bertin, §9.

§ V. The most ancient veneration of the Saint: his memory in the Calendars: various festivals, and the translations of the body.

[ ] The Saint's veneration is most ancient: That the veneration of S. Audomarus is ancient is clearly gathered from the Life and from other writers praised in this Commentary, some of whom flourished in the VIII or IX century: for all constantly attribute to him the title of Blessed or of Saint. The miracle which is narrated in the first Life, num. 17, suggests that the sanctity of S. Audomarus was already acknowledged and venerated when it happened, namely a short space after B. Audomarus' death, so that his veneration seems to have existed in the very VII century in which he died: for of his veneration in the VIII and IX century there is no doubt from the Life itself. What I said in S. Bertin, §13, about his veneration begun not many years after his death, can equally probably be said of S. Audomarus; nevertheless it cannot be shown in what year precisely the men of Saint-Omer or of Thérouanne began publicly to honor their Patron with a truly ecclesiastical veneration.

[41] his memory announced in various Calendars of the IX century; Mabillon in the Annals, tom. 1, pag. 486, and others assert that the memory of S. Audomarus is announced at the IX of September in the Martyrologies of Usuard and of Ado. But in the genuine Martyrology of Ado Audomarus is not read. Hence our Sollerius in his Observations on Usuard at the IX of September judges that Usuard did not find the name of Audomarus reported in other Calendars. He announces him thus: In the territory of Thérouanne, of saint Autmarus bishop and confessor. The memory of S. Audomarus is indeed read in certain codices ascribed to Florus, and in two of these in our hands, before tom. 2 of March, such a eulogy is found: On the same day at Thérouanne the deposition of S. Audomarus bishop and confessor, who, dead to the world, living to God, and mighty with the signs of very many virtues, converted the people of the city of Thérouanne to the divine worship. But these things do not seem to be of Florus, but of some later writer, as Sollerius himself proved in the preface to Usuard. Usuard however could have found the memory of S. Audomarus in the Calendar of Corbie, which d'Achery published in tom. 2 of the reprinted Spicilegium, where at pag. 67 it is thus announced at the IX of September: And the deposition of S. Audomarus the bishop. That Calendar is proved to have been written in the year 826. In the same manner the Saint's deposition is announced on the IX of September in another ancient Calendar of Corbie in Martène and Durand, tom. 3 of the Thesaurus Anecdotorum, col. [ ]. In the same authors, tom. 6 of the Collectio ampla, Audomarus is found on the same day in the Martyrology of Stavelot and in that of Auxerre.

[42] Longer eulogies are woven for S. Audomarus in the various Supplements to Usuard in our Sollerius. [and generally in the more recent ones at the 9th of September, on which the festival is celebrated:] I bring forward one from the Brussels codex: In the territory of Thérouanne or of the Morini, the deposition of saint Audomarus bishop and confessor. Who, being blind, and enlightened at the elevation of the body of blessed Vedast, asked and obtained that his blindness should return. In the enlarged codices of Ado too Georgius found Audomarus on the same day, who also assigns certain other Martyrologies in his Annotations at this day. A prolix eulogy of the Saint the author of our manuscript Florarium wove today, and a still more prolix one Saussay in the Gallican Martyrology; but neither adds anything to what has been said, or to what is to be read in the Life, except some errors inserted in Saussay's eulogy. Finally all the more recent martyrologists generally announce him with today's Roman Martyrology, but some with the name somewhat changed: for Maurolyco calls him Autmarius, Felicius Authenarius; and both wrongly substitute Taruarensis for the bishopric of Thérouanne. More rightly the Roman: In the territory of Thérouanne, of saint Audomarus the bishop. But far more fully the Paris one in this manner: In the territory of Thérouanne, of saint Audomarus, from a monk of Luxeuil bishop of Thérouanne, who recalled that nation, for the greater part returned to the worship of idols, to the faith of Christ: his body was buried in the church of Sithiu built by himself, which, after Thérouanne had been destroyed and the bishopric divided into three dioceses, was made the cathedral of one of them under Audomarus' own name. This festival of S. Audomarus is celebrated with the most solemn rite, with cessation from work and with an Octave.

[43] Another festival of S. Audomarus is also announced in the IX century at the 1st day of November, another festival of his celebrated in the IX century on the 1st of November, on which it was celebrated before the feast of All Saints was common to the whole Church. The praised Calendar of the year 826 in d'Achery on the 1st day of November, after the birthday of S. Cæsarius, has thus: And of saint Audomarus the bishop, or of All Saints. The second place was given to Audomarus before the festival of All Saints, because this was not yet common in the year 826. In the Corbie Hieronymian in the same d'Achery at the 1st of November these things are read added by a more recent hand: At the monastery of Sithiu, the deposition of saint Audomarus bishop and confessor. In another Corbie codex, far more contracted, published by us after the seventh volume of June, at the 2nd of November it is thus: At the monastery of Sithiu, the deposition of saint Audomarus the bishop. Wrongly in both places is it deposition, since the elevation of the body was formerly celebrated on the 1st day of November, and is still announced on that day after the feast of All Saints in the Breviary of Saint-Omer, which we have printed in the year 1518.

[44] Further, from this festival I gather that the body of S. Audomarus was elevated before the year 826; [from which it seems to follow that some elevation of the body was made before the year 826:] and that the feast of that elevation was celebrated on the 1st of November. I find nothing indeed committed to writing about that first elevation: yet the elevation is made likely also from a fact presently to be reported: for we shall see that the Saint's body was in the year 843 stolen away by abbot Hugh, chiefly by the agency of Morus the sacristan. But that carrying off would not have been so easy if it had always until that time remained hidden underground in its first sepulcher. Wherefore I cannot doubt that the body of S. Audomarus had been elevated, whether that was done in the VIII century or at the beginning of the IX. So in S. Bertin, num. 156, we have probably shown that some festival of the elevation of S. Bertin was customary in the X century, which was celebrated on the 2nd day of November. Hence it may be suspected that the bodies of those Saints were elevated on two consecutive days; but that the monuments of the elevation have perished, since they appear nowhere. Certainly that festival of S. Audomarus, which was afterward omitted, is more ancient than all the elevations and translations now known; and it seems to have been omitted on account of the feast of All Saints, after other similar festivals of S. Audomarus had been instituted.

[45] The Bringing-back of the body is celebrated as a feast on the 8th of June: Of these the earlier is the Bringing-back, or the feast of the body brought back in the year 843, of which Molanus at the VIII of June says thus: At the monastery of Sithiu, the Bringing-back or translation of S. Audomarus the bishop, when Folquin brought back his body from Lisbourg, abbot Hugh having been put to flight, in the year DCCCXLIII, and laid it up underground at Sithiu beside the body of blessed Bertin. Where for many years it lay hidden indeed from men, but was revealed when the Lord willed. The same translation is briefly announced in the Anchin codex of Usuard in our Sollerius, and by several more recent writers, as was said in the Prætermissi at the VIII of June. Of the same there is treatment in Grevenus at the XI of June, and at the VII of the same month the same festival occurs in some Missal, as may be seen in the Prætermissi at those days. The occasion of this festival, which was formerly celebrated with cessation from work, as is clear from the last two miracles of the third Life, is narrated at length in the third Life, chap. 4, and the fact is there rightly attached to the year 843: for it happened in the 6th Indiction, in the month of June, and in the time of abbot Hugh, who was slain in the year 844 in battle near Toulouse, nor did he preside over the abbey of Sithiu so long that in his time there was ever a 6th Indiction in the month of June, except in the assigned year 843. Folquin the Bertinian Levite, who in his manuscript historical Chartulary first narrated the cause of the aforesaid festival, agrees about the year, writing thus: At this season we find it thus noted in the nineteen-year cycles of the years of the Lord's Incarnation, which is DCCCXLVI, in the VI Indiction, that the body of saint Audomarus is brought back from the farm of Liesgesborch to its own place, and the solemnity of that translation is devoutly celebrated in the month of June by the people of Thérouanne. He adds that the origin of that festival was not yet known to most in his own time; and that therefore he wished to write that translation as he understood from the elders that it had been done. Folquin therefore was the first to write that fact from tradition; and from him others drew, as is plain from comparison.

[46] because, when abbot Hugh had stolen the body away, Wherefore I transfer hither the whole account of Folquin, as it was communicated to me from the manuscript Chartulary by a faithful friend, that it may be compared with the accounts of later writers. Abbot Hugh therefore, already mentioned — apart from the matter which I report, a man in all things praiseworthy — after he had laudably established this place by his constitution, by which also he justly subjected the canons of saint Audomarus to the monks of saint Bertin by a capitular description, and appointed a monk from the lower monastery [\] to the guardianship of saint Audomarus, being struck by a diabolical arrow, began to devise how he might as quickly as possible carry the body of saint Audomarus — by whose help and aid, together with his comrade Bertin, the people of Thérouanne was governed — to Vermandois, to the monastery of saint Quentin, since he governed that too. Fearing however the animosity of the common people, having gathered a multitude of the men of Vermandois, he attempts to drag it away by force, in case he should be hindered by the people. He came meanwhile, and, a certain monk named Morus being the guardian, taking the sacred body of our holy Prelate and Patron, carried it with his multitude as far as the farm named Liegesburch. But by the working of God's providence, they remained three days in the aforesaid farm with the consecrated body.*

[47] Meanwhile it had happened that Folquin, the illustrious prelate of the city of Thérouanne, was going about the parishes of his bishopric after the episcopal manner, it was brought back by bishop Folquin, that, if anywhere anything were done against the statutes of the holy canons, the careful pastor might learn of it: and with such zeal he came with pious carefulness as far as the cell called Woromhold. Meanwhile, when there they had come to table, at which most sumptuous services were being prepared, as for so great a pontiff, the brother of that same blessed prelate flies to him, announcing a grave and irreparable ruin for the country, if it should be accomplished — namely that saint Audomarus had been carried off from his monastery, and, unless he quickly came to the rescue, was to be borne away to saint Quentin's at Vermandois. Hearing this, the holy priest of the Lord, exceedingly troubled within, said: Go to my brother; and go around the people of my whole bishopric with all care: and on the third day be ready within the walls of the city of Thérouanne with all of them; and I will be present with those whom, with Christ's help, I shall bring with me from these parts. Then at last, if the Saint himself shall help, I am prepared by all means to wrest him away. And when these things had been duly carried out according to the word of the blessed pontiff, on the third day there is present in the city of Thérouanne an innumerable multitude, almost never before seen by him [\]. Then the priest of the Lord with all this multitude follows after the aforesaid abbot with his men with all haste as far as the farm named above. But they, eager to lift up the holy body and to take flight, were by no means able with any multitude to raise it from the ground. And when, an even greater multitude being added, they strove twice and thrice to lift it, it none the less remains so unmoved as if it were held fixed to the ground by certain roots. Then without delay for any convenience they hasten their flight, the body of the Saint being left behind.*

[48] But blessed Folquin, giving them room to flee, taking that treasure most precious than all gold, with miracles accompanying, and it was laid in the earth: by the road he had come with all the multitude of the peoples, carries it back to its own place, whence it had been taken [\]. But when they came at Thérouanne to the river which is called the Lys [\], all the above-mentioned multitude of the people, without any delay wading on foot through the water of the river, when the stream had been passed, not the moisture of a single drop appeared on their clothing; and as they went forward through the corn-bearing crops of the fields — for so numerous throngs of the peoples could not avoid them — although the ears were bent to the ground as though threshed with sledges, when the multitude had passed, they so thickened the furrows that you might plainly recognize that the fields too rejoiced together at the coming [\] of their Protector. But the clerics of both monasteries stood anxiously awaiting the outcome of the matter. But after it was given to their eyes to behold, though from afar, the multitude of the people coming, the bell-ropes being pulled, they all gave the voice of those who praise in the highest. But the aforesaid Morus, guardian of the church, was then sitting at table about to feast: and hearing the sound of the bells, he asks what was the cause for which the peoples were exulting with so great joy; and it was told him by those who related it that saint Audomarus had been brought back by Folquin the pontiff, and that for this all the people were exulting with so great gladness. Hearing which, exceedingly troubled, he at once imprecated the anger of God upon those who brought him back. Not yet had the unlawful words fallen from his mouth, when suddenly he fell face-down to the ground, and, stiff in his whole body, with the sinews of his limbs stretched out, he withered half-alive. So, stupefied, he was carried to saint Bertin's, and there by a long sickness repented of what he had committed in words. For, though sight and hearing were recovered, he was so deprived of sense to the end that he could never perceive in what quarter the monastery of saint Audomarus was seen to be placed. But the prelate Folquin laid the body of blessed Audomarus in the earth, lest it could be carried off in like manner by those who came after.*

[49] some observations on the foregoing. Now some things must be observed upon this account. First, the village of Liegesborch, now generally called Lisbourg, is in Artois, where the river Lisa, here called Leia from the Flemish name Leye, rises. Secondly, although the author does not say for what cause abbot Hugh stayed three days with the sacred body in that village, yet it is likely that this happened because the body had already before Folquin's arrival become immovable there: for I do not see why abbot Hugh with his men should have stayed three days at Lisbourg, unless because he could not remove the sacred treasure thence: for the village of Lisbourg is much nearer to Thérouanne and Saint-Omer than to Saint-Quentin, whither he was making his way. This miracle could have been omitted and unknown to the writers, because Hugh, covered with shame, had been silent about it with his men of Vermandois. The anonymous writer in Mabillon, Benedictine cent. 3, pag. 174, and from him John of Ypres, both Bertinian writers, assert that the body of S. Audomarus was laid up underground beside the body of B. Bertin, that is in the Bertinian abbey. But here and in the third Life it is only said that it was laid in the earth; but it is not asserted that it was placed beside the body of B. Bertin, which at that time did not yet lie hidden underground, but was afterward hidden by the same S. Folquin, as the same anonymous author narrates a little after in Mabillon, pag. 125, and John of Ypres, chap. 13. Besides, from what follows it will be plain that the body of S. Audomarus was in the X century in the hands of the canons of the church of Saint-Omer, and not with the monks of S. Bertin. Certain other things I shall observe, and shall further confirm these, in the Annotations to the third Life, chap. 4.

[50] The festival of the Finding of S. Audomarus: Another festival of S. Audomarus is announced at the XXI of October, and is called the Finding of S. Audomarus. The manuscript Florarium Sanctorum at the XXI of October has thus of it: The finding of the body of saint Audomarus bishop of the Morini. Some things well enough known are added about miracles, but nothing about the finding itself. In the supplements to Usuard in our Sollerius the same Finding occurs from the Anchin codex and from Molanus' edition. Wion records that festival in these words: On the same day at Sithiu, the finding of S. Audomarus bishop of the Morini and confessor. To these, besides the manuscript Calendars, are added Ménard, Saussay and Ferrari, who announce that Finding in the monastery of Sithiu, which must be expounded of the monastery of the canons, that is the present cathedral church. In the Ordinal of Saint-Omer praised before, at the XXI of October, the Finding is prescribed to be celebrated with an Office of nine lessons in the double rite; as also in the ancient Breviary of the same church; as it is also in the present Ordinal. Nevertheless I find nowhere clearly explained on what occasion or by whom that festival was instituted.

[51] If it is permitted to use conjectures, I suspect that it was instituted about the middle of the X century, whose occasion and beginning have not become known for certain. because the Saint's body, hidden by S. Folquin in the IX century, was then either found, or rather again brought into the knowledge of all and elevated: for the place where it had been laid by Folquin had probably always remained known to some. The reason of this conjecture is that both in the Breviary praised before, and in the Ordinal of Saint-Omer, both the ancient and the present one, there are given for this feast of the Finding lessons to be recited about the body translated to Nijmegen of the Batavians, and about the miracles wrought in that translation, so that the finding is hinted to have been made not long before this translation, which happened in the time of the emperor Otto I, and is narrated in the third Life, chap. 4, where I shall elucidate the particulars in the annotations. Further, that the festival of the finding seems to me to have been instituted rather because the Saint's body was on the occasion of that translation again brought forth into the public light, than because it was found by some chance, I have already given notice. The reason has already been partly given from the Office of the finding. The other is that I find no monument, manuscript or printed, about any finding of S. Audomarus, not even in Malbrancq, who diligently searched the archives of Saint-Omer. But whatever be the cause of that feast, this I here observe,

that it is easily gathered from the whole history of the said translation that the body of S. Audomarus was at that time in his own church, and not in the church of S. Bertin. Another translation of S. Audomarus is recorded by us in tom. 1 of June, pag. 743, in S. Gudwal: for the body of S. Audomarus is said to have been carried to Harlebeke, and thence with the bodies of SS. Gudwal and Bertulf to the monastery of Blandinium of S. Peter. But that carrying was made only to increase the solemnity of the translation of SS. Gudwal and Bertulf.

\ inferiori monasterio*

\* i.e. not seen

\ sublatus*

\ Lisa*

\ adventui*

§ VI. The inspection of the body made in the XI century: the head adorned: certain relics preserved in other places: certain other matters about the Saint's apparitions.

[ ] When some doubted whether most of S. Audomarus' bones were in his casket, Malbrancq, book 8, chap. 44, from the monuments of Saint-Omer, which have not come into my hands, narrates a solemn inspection of the body of S. Audomarus, carried out by Guy archbishop of Reims and Drogo bishop of Thérouanne, with Athala countess of Flanders and many noble men present. Malbrancq's narrative is too prolix for me to care to transfer the whole of it hither, especially since I do not know whether all the circumstances are equally certain. Wherefore I shall give a summary of the whole matter, and shall select those heads which seem to be drawn from the monuments. The occasion of the inspection was the finding of the body of S. Bertin, of which I treated in S. Bertin, §13, where I showed that that finding happened in the year 1050, and that the elevation of S. Bertin followed in the year 1052. This finding brought it about that some doubted about the completeness of the bones of S. Audomarus, which were preserved in his casket: for the Bertinians, before the body of S. Bertin was found, used to show a certain casket by which they believed the relics of S. Bertin were contained, as may be read in the Finding of the body of S. Bertin, written by abbot Bovo, in our work at num. 25 and 26. When this error had been detected by the finding of the body, a suspicion arose about the body of S. Audomarus, because someone had said that in that casket which had been attributed to Bertin there was contained no small part of the body of S. Audomarus, says Malbrancq.

[53] the sacred bones are inspected by two bishops, The men of Saint-Omer therefore, in order to remove that doubt, asked through three canons that Guy archbishop of Reims would be willing to hasten to Saint-Omer, and to inspect the sacred bones of S. Audomarus, as he had elevated the body of S. Bertin. The archbishop assented, and came thither with Drogo bishop of Thérouanne and other chief ecclesiastics, where Athala countess of Flanders, the wife of count Baldwin, was already present. When therefore, says Malbrancq, a solemnity had been proclaimed by public herald on the feast day of the Finding of the Cross (the III of May), to which the greatest multitude of men had flocked together, Guy the archbishop and Drogo the bishop, Athala the countess with many ecclesiastics and monks betake themselves to the church of Saint-Omer. The doors being closed, there is brought into the midst the casket in which the body of S. Audomarus was wont to be exposed to the veneration of the faithful. Smiths are employed to open the chest: and when the outer shrine had been opened, another was found: which being laid open, says Malbrancq, they behold the bones of B. Audomarus contained in a certain waxed linen cloth, and moreover bound round most becomingly from the neck to the feet with a stole and a maniple; as if you had seen a little infant bound in his cradle and wrapped about with a swaddling-band… But to unloose the wrappings the hands of Guy and Drogo alone now come together; and while they gaze more carefully; … behold, at the feet there appears a little cross interwoven with gold and silk, clinging to that linen and stole. These words were still read written in golden characters: "This sign of the cross shall be in heaven, when the Lord shall come to judge"…

[54] [with many witnesses present: nearly all the Saint's bones are said to have been found,] For the rest, the writer of the event produces these witnesses: both prelates, seven abbots — Heremarus of S. Remigius, Bovo of S. Bertin, Rumold of S. Winnoc, Gervin of S. Richarius, Folbert of S. Bavo, Heribert of S. Judocus, Alfrid of S. Wlmarus — two archdeacons, Hubert and John, Constantine dean of the church of Reims, Ulric presbyter of the same, Hugh of Lariacum, Siccard scholastic of the church of Saint-Omer with the other canons of that place; Jodo, Alberic, Stephen, Gotselin, canons of Thérouanne, and other prudent men both clerics and monks, besides a throng of noble laymen; all of whom, when, the stole and the linen being removed, the bones are revealed, prostrate with face and body bent to the ground, with tears abundantly poured forth, … prolonged their prayers for two hours… Then with a serious and diligent examination the arrangement of the sacred members was inspected and set in order, and seemed to be complete in all its parts, except a few joints of the fingers, and some teeth, and some fragments too of the ribs. So indeed Malbrancq: but he does not say that skilled anatomists were present, who could have given a more accurate judgment on that matter.

[55] from which some small portions are given to those present: Malbrancq subjoins to the foregoing: But since very many were panting for some small portion, the canons and Athala the countess, who was discharging the duties of her husband Baldwin, entered into consultation as to what of the relics they could grant without notable loss of so great a pledge. To Guy the archbishop they granted one of the joints of the right hand; to the abbots Heremarus, Bovo, Rumold, and to Constantine the dean, one tooth each was given, Drogo distributing them: nor yet did he wish himself to go ungifted. There came besides Ingelramnus the lord of Lillers, surrounded by his canons, … to whom they granted another tooth, Roger canon of Lillers receiving it. These things being accomplished, the bones of the most blessed Father are returned to the shrine in the same manner as before, wrapped in a new linen cloth also waxed, bound with the stole and the maniple; there was added likewise the wrapping of an upper pall. And thus it is carried outside the enclosures of the temple to the waiting people by Drogo the bishop, with great exultation of the clergy following after; and is laid down upon a huge heap of stones, which had been gathered there for the building of the new temple.

[56] While the people there honor the sacred relics, the archbishop performed the sacred ministries in the church, then, the solemnity being accomplished, the relics are returned to their place. and then with Drogo the bishop carried back the sacred bones to the church, and placed them on the altar. But before the chest was covered with its lid, it pleased them to put in the written testimonies of the more honorable men, for the future memory of the matter, together with a silver cross bearing an inscription of the name, with the seal of S. Mary of the church of Reims added. And all these things a larger shrine covered, armed with much iron by the industry of the smiths, and finally another rich with silver plates. The year in which these things were accomplished is not assigned by Malbrancq; but since they were done after the elevation of the body of S. Bertin, which happened in the year 1052 on the 2nd day of May; and since nearly the same persons were present at both solemnities, this solemnity is to be fixed not long after the year 1052, especially since Guy the archbishop is said in the Sainte-Marthes to have died in the year 1055. In tom. 1 of February, pag. 48, very many bodies of Saints are said to have been carried in the year 1070 to the dedication of the temple of Hasnon, and among them are recounted the bodies of SS. Audomarus and Bertin.

[57] That the body of S. Audomarus was afterward more often examined The Saint's head adorned: the body still in his own church, is credible and likely, although a distinct notice of the other inspections has not come down to us. Certainly Le Roy in the Chronicon Belgicum at the year 1313 writes that the head of blessed Audomarus was wonderfully adorned by Mahaut countess of Artois. The casket therefore had to be opened when the sacred head was separated from the other bones, whether that was done at that very time or earlier. Nevertheless the Saint's body was not removed, certainly not forever, from his own church, in which De Raissius rightly writes in the Hierogazophylacium Belgicum, pag. 75, that it is preserved; because, even if perhaps more bones are missing than the just-praised Malbrancq would have it, I should not think so many are lacking that it cannot be called a body. Wherefore I do not sufficiently understand from what Mabillon was led into that opinion, so as to observe this in his Annotations to the Acts of S. Audomarus, cent. 2, pag. 565: His body is held in the church of the monastery of Sithiu, apart from the head and certain bones, which are preserved in the church of B. Mary at Saint-Omer. The same he repeats in tom. 1 of the Annals, pag. 486, where he rightly adds: We saw his rain-cloak in the sacristy of saint Bertin, with a hood sewn to it against the injury of the rain, whence an ornament of that kind received its name. That this was seen there by Mabillon I would not deny.

[58] But he did not see in the church of S. Bertin the body of S. Audomarus, or the chief part of the body: nor did he even hear in the Bertinian abbey, as I judge, but not in the Bertinian abbey, unless perhaps some part. that the whole body of S. Audomarus was preserved there, except the head and some bones. Certainly none of the Bertinian Religious asserted anything of the kind to me or to my colleagues, when some years ago we visited the Bertinian abbey. Nay rather some said candidly that that Saint's body is preserved in his own cathedral church, as the men of Saint-Omer assert without hesitation. I know indeed that that opinion about a part of the body preserved in the Bertinian abbey, which gave occasion for the inspection of the body, on Malbrancq's testimony, was not altogether laid aside by the said inspection, or at any rate revived in the XV century, when by Guillaume de Fillastre bishop of Tournai and abbot of S. Bertin the casket was opened in which a part of the bones of S. Audomarus was said to be preserved. For when a certain charter had been found in the casket, by which a part of the bones of S. Audomarus was asserted to be there, a controversy arose between the praised bishop-abbot and the canons. Nevertheless it was at length so composed that the said relics were deposited in the same chest in which the body of S. Bertin is preserved, yet set apart in a separate bundle from the body of S. Bertin. But afterward the Bertinians did not pugnaciously contend that those were relics of S. Audomarus: which does not appear very likely to me either, since no documents are produced about the Saint's body having been notably divided by S. Folquin or by anyone else. But whatever it be about those relics, it is certain that Mabillon errs, and Baillet, who wrote the same things as he about the body of S. Audomarus at the IX of September; when they attribute the body, except the head and certain bones, to the Bertinian abbey, whereas not even the Bertinians themselves would have so small a part attributed to the men of Saint-Omer. Perhaps Mabillon was led into this second error from his earlier error, by which he wrote that the body of Audomarus was deposited in the abbey by S. Folquin.

[59] Certain small portions of the relics preserved in other places: Further, from what was said at num. 53 and 54 it is abundantly clear that various small portions were separated from the bones of S. Audomarus, and consequently were preserved in other places. De Raissius, just praised, assigns some; namely at pag. 127, in the monastery of Brogne of S. Gerard, of the Order of S. Benedict, a finger of S. Audomarus bishop of the Morini; and at pag. 199, in the cathedral church of S. Donatian at Bruges, a tooth of S. Audomarus

a tooth, and a bone of the hand. Then something of the relics of S. Audomarus he reckons at pag. 42 among the sacred treasure of the collegiate church of S. Amatus at Douai; at pag. 128 he likewise assigns something to the treasure of the Benedictine virgins of the town of Bourbourg in Flanders near the borders of Artois; and finally at pag. 305 he ascribes something of S. Audomarus to the cathedral church of Arras. Perhaps other small portions too are held in other places.

[60] apparitions and certain other matters. For the rest, certain things about S. Audomarus are read in the Miracles of S. Bertin, and elsewhere, which I transfer hither in few words. In the Book of the miracles of S. Bertin, in our work at pag. 600, S. Audomarus is said in the time of the Norman incursions to have appeared to Herricus a monk, and to have charged him that the fortifications should be completed which had been begun against the Normans at Sithiu, but had been left unfinished. The figure and appearance of him who appeared is asserted to have been thus described by Herricus: He was of tall stature, of venerable white hair, having on his forehead the marks of a most beautiful baldness spreading apart in their brightness, of a comely and slender face, with a nose moderately long and a little hooked, with hands whose very long fingers shone with a most beautiful thinness of leanness, clothed in the episcopal fillet. The rest pertaining to this apparition may be read in the place assigned. In the Finding of the body of S. Bertin, in our work at pag. 615, abbot Bovo attributes to the patronage of S. Vincent the martyr, and of the Saints Audomarus and Bertin, that the monastery of Sithiu was of old preserved from destruction. Wonderful too is the apparition which is narrated in the Miracles of S. Vedast, tom. 1 of February, pag. 807: and in this mention is made of SS. Audomarus and Bertin, as may be seen. To these finally I subjoin the various Lives of the Saint.

LIFE

by an anonymous author,

From our manuscript codex, collated with the edition of Mabillon.

Audomarus bishop conf., at the villa of Wavrans near Saint-Omer in Artois (S.)

BHL Number: 0764

By an Anonymous writer.

PREFACE

God, calling all men to salvation, To the almighty Lord, the Bestower of spiritual gifts and of great powers, we ought to render manifold thanks and diligent praises, who, being the Founder and Governor of all creatures visible and invisible, sent his only-begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ to the earth to teach and to redeem the nations of every kind ^a. Who, for the sake of human salvation taking immaculate flesh from the Virgin Mary, deigned to snatch from the power of the prince of darkness the whole human race — sold through the first man seduced by the devil's persuasion, and brought under the most bloody yoke of the devil, and condemned to death and to perpetual punishments; and thereafter he called to life all men from Adam to Christ, bound by the chains of sins through the demon's fraud, and oppressed by the greatest weights of crimes, now set free by himself out of all the climes of the world, saying thus: Come to me all, and the rest. Who, when twelve [\] Apostles had been chosen from the throng of the whole human race, commands the Almighty that sixty ^b and two others also of another order should be his disciples, the regions having been made white, lest laborers should be lacking to the great harvest; and these, filled in the upper room of Sion with the holy Breath, and enriched with the wondrous gift of all tongues, he commanded to go to teach and to baptize the nations of every kind, saying: Go, teach all nations*, and the rest. And these disciples of Christ, speaking with all tongues, preaching the word of the Lord in all provinces, and working many powers through the grace of God, and bearing various kinds of torments through the savage fury of the pagans, and desiring to pour out their blood for Christ, went forth through the three-cornered world.

[2] After these, and after their successors, he granted that other holy men, endowed with the grace of God to the western parts he gave Audomarus as a teacher. and filled with the same Spirit — for there is no respect of persons with God — fulfilling what he promised: I will pour out of my spirit upon all flesh, should be the vicars of the Apostles in all parts of the world. Whence almighty God, who has care of all, who wills all men to be saved, gave to the peoples placed in the Western parts of the world, blinded by the foul darknesses of errors, subject to the devil, weighed down by the mass of sins, and rolled in the sewer of crimes, Audomarus as an apostolic teacher, adorned with divine gifts, known in many parts of the world by signs and powers. Therefore we pray thee, almighty God, through the glorious patronage of that same Pontiff, that thou wouldst grant the abundant streams of thy wisdom from on high to bedew our minds, stained though they be, so that of the merits and virtues of so great a Man, which thy grace wrought through him, we may be able to set forth for those who wish to know [\], though small things of great [\], and few of many. For who can know and narrate his daily manner of life and his constancy in the service of God, and all the labors which he wrought in secret, with God alone as witness?

ANNOTATIONS.

\ Mab. duobus & decem*

\ Mab. faultily volentes*

\ ibid. parvi*

CHAPTER I.

The Saint's country, parents, monastic life, episcopate, promulgation of the faith, and his other deeds.

[ ] The Saint born in a noble place near Constance, with his father Friulf This holy pontiff Audomarus therefore was sprung of [\] noble and renowned parents according to the dignity of the world, and instructed in the Catholic faith, in the region of Constance [\], and not far from the city of Constance ^a, and he was born particularly in that place which [\] is called Aurea-Vallis. And his father, illustrious among his own people, was called Friulf ^b; and his mother was named Domitta. And these religious parents were rearing the aforesaid Boy from the cradle in ecclesiastical discipline, according to the rite of the Christian Religion, by the favor of divine grace: for they had Audomarus as their only son. But Friulf, after the death of his aforesaid wife, and as the Boy grew in age and in grace, with the divine mercy urging him [\], strove to submit himself to the sweet and light yoke of Christ, with his son Audomarus encouraging and persuading him. Both therefore, namely the father Friulf with his blessed son Audomarus, fulfilling what is written, Go and sell all that thou hast, and give to the poor, and come follow me: and thou shalt have eternal life; dead to the world, alive to God, poor in fleeting things, rich [\] in everlasting ones; subject to God, rebels against the devil, alike in mind, unlike in age, went on to the monastery of the soldiers of Christ which by its famous name is called Luxeuil ^c, and which was founded in the name of God in the region of Burgundy by a man of holy memory, an Irishman [\], B. Columbanus the abbot.

[4] To saint Austasius ^d the abbot [\], therefore, who then presided over the holy and blessed multitude of monks in the aforesaid monastery, Audomarus with his father with one accord make known [\] their religious desires, he becomes a monk at Luxeuil, and there shines with virtues: following what is written: Ask thy father, and he will declare to thee [\]; thy elders, and they will tell thee. And saint Austasius, perceiving that they burned with the love of God, and recognizing that in B. Audomarus' countenance and words there had been [\] divine grace, gave to the aforesaid servants of God salutary and perfect counsel according to the authority of holy Scripture, urging both, sometimes together, sometimes separately, that they should persevere [\] with him under regular discipline in the service of God. Both therefore, burning with divine love, following the counsel of their spiritual father Austasius, submitted themselves with devout mind to the yoke of the holy Rule. Blessed Austasius therefore, filled with immense joy, joined them to the holy fellowship of the monks. Thereafter S. Audomarus, full of spiritual grace, tender in age, robust in faith, subject to the strict rigor of the Rule, was trained among the holy people of the monks, and by the persuasion of divine grace was beloved by all the soldiers of Christ dwelling in the aforesaid monastery. For he was chaste in mind and in body, filled with obedience and humility, learned in divine knowledge, full of charity and gentleness, chastened with the strict fasts of frugality, wakeful in the long vigils of the nights, knowing what is written: Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching.*

[5] Thereafter the fame of B. Audomarus, spread abroad through many places, made bishop, he converts the gentile Morini, came to the knowledge of Dagobert king of the Franks: for a city set upon a mountain ^e cannot be hidden. After this, with many years intervening, being called by the aforesaid most reverend prince Dagobert ^f and by the whole people of the Franks, with S. Acharius ^g bishop of Noyon helping, he received with great humility of mind the episcopal ⁱ honor, for the teaching and the governing of the people of the city of Thérouanne ^h: in which rank, sowing the Divine word in the hearts of believers, healing the sicknesses of souls and bodies, redeeming captives and those in chains, having care of widows and of the needy above all, he duly governed the people entrusted to him by the Lord. The aforesaid people of Thérouanne therefore, although before the coming of B. Audomarus they had heard the divine word from the companions of Dionysius ^k the martyr, namely from Fuscianus ^l and Victoricus, at that same time in which S. Quintinus was preaching in the city of Amiens, many of those men of Thérouanne still clung to the worship [\*] of idols.

[6] For after the two aforesaid blessed men Fuscianus and Victoricus went on from the aforesaid city of the men of Thérouanne, and destroys idolatry. and were crowned with martyrdom in the city of the men of Amiens, then the men of Thérouanne returned again to the worship of idols. For not only those who before had been unwilling to receive the name of the Lord, but also those who had been baptized by the aforesaid fathers, led by a like error worshipped idols ^m. The aforesaid chief pontiff Audomarus therefore, entering that same city, delivered the salutary precepts of the divine word to the stolid hearts of the pagans, and enlightened with the abundant light of the Gospel their savage minds, which were blinded ⁿ by the foul darknesses of ignorance, and, destroying [\] the vain images, delivered them to the fire, and utterly overthrew the sacrilegious worship of idols in the aforesaid city, and converted all the people dwelling in it to the Catholic faith, with divine grace favoring him: for with everyone that works good, God works together: for if, as the apostle testifies, God be for us, who is against us?*

[7] [When the Saint was staying at Boulogne, a certain youth, not having obtained leave from him,] But after the aforesaid Pontiff had converted the aforesaid people to the worship of the true God, preaching the divine word to the throngs flocking to him from every side, and delivering many in the name of God from various sicknesses, the divine bounty granted him signs of great powers, of which the following discourse now hastens, with Christ's favor, to set forth a few, from among his nourishing virtues. On a certain day Audomarus, the excellent confessor of Christ, staying in the city of Boulogne ^o, after the nocturnal vigils rising at dawn according to his accustomed manner, entered the church to pray, and there, throughout the long space of a summer's day, preaching the word of God to the throngs standing about, and singing Mass for the Christian people, and laying hands on the sick with various kinds of diseases, at the midday hours the venerable Old man [p] of holy life laid himself down wearied upon his bed, wishing thereupon to grant a small space of rest to his poor body wearied with many labors. One of those standing about him

servants, wanton in his youthful age, came to him, saying: Lord, grant me now to have thy leave with me; I wish now to go to the places near the sea. Then the Old man said to the youth who asked before the crowd: Thou hast not leave, my son, to go abroad yet: for I think it better for thee to wait here a little while, until thou see me rise safe from sleep. For the provident Watchman of his flock, full of the prophetic spirit, foresaw that it would be an evil thing for the erring youth to depart. Then the weary Old man, lulled by sleep, thus fell silent.

[8] enters a little boat, and is imperiled at sea: But the youth, scorning the commands of his excellent Patron — as it is the custom of the young thus to scorn the orders of the old — then with swift and hurried steps went off to the sea. Then, seeing a little boat standing on the shore, in which men had been [\] accustomed to cross a small river, which is named [\] by the inhabitants in those parts the Elna [q]; but the youth, forgetful and blinded by love of sport, rashly and at once climbed alone into it, wishing himself to play between [\] the banks of this little stream. But a strong force of wind snatched him out to the open sea. Then suddenly a savage tempest rising on the deep, that very boat, shaken by the swelling waves, having neither rudder nor helmsman, wandering here and there with the billows, was floating on that sea which with a great gulf separates Britain from the Franks, which often does harm here, the strongest ships being sunk [r]. But the wretch, seeing neither his own land nor any other, then repented that he had scorned the words of his Patron: he believed that he was dying, with the winds fighting the waves [\]: neither the ship nor the youth could withstand the deep. Then God, at his trembling prayer, through the merits of Audomarus, straightway brought him to the Saxon [s] land. Then again, stupefied at beholding unknown fields, trembling, he feared that robbers would strip him, if he should try to wait there alone any longer.

[9] but, the help of S. Audomarus being invoked, Hence, confessing his ninth [\] fault of disobedience, with tears abundantly poured out begging help, then calling with trembling voice upon Audomarus as his patron, trusting in the Lord he quickly runs back to the ship [\]. The Almighty, granting him a favorable wind, bidding the sea, before swelling, grow mild, the little boat floating again over a calm sea, he had returned [\] safe once more to the safe [\] harbor, from which the strong East wind had before snatched him, where the aforesaid stream Elna enters [\] into the sea. The sailor, rising at once and recognizing the familiar fields, leaving his ship unharmed on the shore, treading the shore-seaweed with swift steps, giving manifold thanks to the Almighty, in penitence runs back again to his Patron. The Bishop was still staying in that place in which he had before left him lulled in sleep — by the wonderful mercy of almighty God that man had returned [\] swiftly at the very same hours. Then, drawing near to the doorposts of the hall where the old man was praying, the wretch, cast down quickly to the ground many times, confessing his fault with wet face, sighing with weeping, begged pardon with abundant tears.

[10] Then the Old man said gently, rebuking him: Son, he is wonderfully delivered from peril. I told thee beforehand what was to come, that it did not befit thee to go abroad today. Why didst thou afterward dare to despise our word? Then the trembling youth answered his Patron: My fault, Lord, truly my fault: pardon wretched me, brought back by thee from death. Then he, as we have said, telling his perils — that alone amid the swelling billows of the Ocean, and amid the devouring surges of the currents running about the rocks, in a small boat, having suffered much upon the deep, he did not believe that he could escape alive from the sea, unless God, by the merits of Audomarus, had delivered from death that poor wretch despairing of human help. Then the sober Old man thus bade the youth be silent, restraining the incautious disciple with humble mind: Do not [\] utter this word again abroad from thy mouth, nor oughtest thou to say these things about me to any man, so long as thou seest [\] me enjoying this brief life, lest the devil overcome us by the fault of boasting; nor ought we to seek praise from the mouth of men, lest vain glory lift our heart on high [t]. Hence after his death that disciple, showing everything in order, narrated what he had suffered in the waves.

ANNOTATIONS.

p. If S. Audomarus was an old man when these things happened, they were probably narrated out of order.

q. In the other Lives Helna, in the Cambrai Ms. Alna. There is noted in the maps near Boulogne a small river flowing there into the sea: and Malbrancq, book 3, chap. 17, teaches that it is now called the Liane.

r. Upon two transcripts of the second Life it is noted that the words about ships often sunk in that strait are those of some interpolator. But those who noted this are deceived, because there is no other reason for that opinion than that they are not in the second Life, where they are omitted; but they are not omitted in the third Life.

s. Malbrancq, book 3, chap. 17, explains the Saxon land as the British, nay Mabillon too, agreeing with him, understood the English; but wrongly, because that youth was not away from Audomarus long enough to have been able to come as far as the shore of Britain and to return thence. Wherefore the Saxon land is not to be sought so far off, since the Saxons too were within the bounds of the Gauls, and in Belgica Secunda itself, to which the Morini belonged, or at any rate in its neighborhood. For in the Notitia dignitatum of the empire throughout the Gauls, published in Duchesne, tom. 1, pag. 3, there are said to be under the disposition … of the duke of Belgica Secunda, the Dalmatian horsemen at Marcæ on the Saxon shore. The Saxon shore therefore was in Belgica Secunda, and consequently was not far from Boulogne. De Valois in the Notitia Galliarum, pag. 315, believes the place Marcæ, where those horsemen were on the Saxon shore, to be the present-day Merq or Merc, which is a village between Calais and Gravelines. But whatever it be about that place, the Saxon shore was probably between Boulogne and present-day Flanders; and there that youth, snatched away by the wind, put in.

t. If anyone considers the style in which this whole event is narrated, he will easily see that it was first narrated in bound style, since many hexameter verses are even now mingled in the account. Hence I think it has come about that the phrasing is often gaping and faulty, because the less skilled author wished only lightly to alter most of the poet's expressions.

\ Mab. &*

\ al. Constantinense*

\ al. qui*

\ Mab. famulante*

\ al. perhennibus*

\ Mab. Hibernense*

\ ibid. abbate*

\ ibid. manifestaverunt*

\ al. &* is added

\ al. esse*

\ al. perseverarent*

\ Mab. cultui*

\ al. destruenda*

\ Mab. fuerunt*

\ Mab. nominant*

\ ibid. in*

\ ibid. in undis*

\ Mab. more rightly notam*

\ ibid. ilico* is added

\ ibid. actutum*

\ ibid. remeavit ad*

\ ibid. intravit*

\ ibid. reversus est*

\ ibid. Nec*

\ al. videas*

CHAPTER II.

SS. Mummolinus, Ebertramnus and Bertin come to Audomarus, who bestows various benefits upon them: the Saint's blindness, last sickness, death, burial, miracles.

[ ] To the Saint comes S. Bertin with his Companions, After this, at no long interval of time ^a, there came to B. Audomarus from the aforesaid region of Constance three men of one mind, Mummolinus and Bertramnus [\*] and saint Bertin ^b together,

leaving also, according to the Lord's precept, parents, country, and all their kinsfolk. And saint Audomarus received the aforesaid servants of God graciously, giving immense thanks to the almighty Lord, who had brought to him such helpers for preaching the Gospel. For the aforesaid men were perfect in the Catholic faith, and learned in ecclesiastical disciplines and in divine Scripture. A short space of time being thereafter passed, S. Audomarus with the aforesaid blessed men, with divine grace urging him, thought to found a monastery in God's name: for by the divine mercy bestowed upon him he had a place fit for monks to dwell in.

[12] For there was a certain powerful man, Adrowald by name, to whom he gives a place for building a monastery: exceedingly rich in the vain riches of this world, whom B. Audomarus converted from the error of heathenism to the Catholic faith, and whom with all his household he baptized. And Adrowald, with prudent counsel scorning the deceitful riches of the present world, and having no son, offered a great part of his inheritance with all his manifold substance to God and to blessed Audomarus, namely the farm \ which is called by the well-known name of Sithiu. And blessed Audomarus in the aforesaid farm, before the coming of the aforesaid men to him, built a church ^c, in that very place too in which his poor body rests in peace. After therefore the aforesaid servants of God came to him, he granted them that they should build [\] a dwelling for monks wherever it should please them in the aforesaid farm. The holy men therefore Mummolinus and Bertin, with the rest of their companions in Christ, began to build a monastery in a certain place, which to this day is called the old monastery: but staying in that place a few years, with divine grace urging them, they wished to choose another place.

[13] The blessed men therefore, trusting in the mercy of the Lord, found a perfect counsel; for straightway going up into a ship without helmsman and without oarage, they afterward build another monastery, with Audomarus favoring it, and without any care of food and drink, sailing here and there on the spacious pool adjoining their aforesaid dwelling, they were asking the almighty Lord that he would bring them unharmed to [\] the place which his mercy had prepared for them, saying to one another that they would not go up from the aforesaid pool, save when, their little boat holding [\] a fitting harbor, it should befall them to sing according to the order of the Psalter the following little verse: This is my rest for ever and ever, here will I dwell, for I have chosen it. The merciful Lord therefore, who is everywhere present to his servants — for the Lord is nigh to all that call upon him — brought the ship in which the aforesaid blessed men were, after some space foreseen for them, straightway to land. Then they too, singing the aforesaid little verse, without delay leaving the ship, joyfully entered upon the land, recognizing also that that place had been delivered to them by the Lord. Thereupon, with B. Audomarus their pious father favoring them, they began to build in God's name a monastery named Sithiu [\*], named from the aforesaid farm, upon the river Aa.

[14] [who appoints Mummolinus abbot there, and afterward Bertin. The Saint becomes blind:] And as religious men flocked together from every side to the aforesaid servants of God, B. Audomarus set Mummolinus over the multitude of monks. But at no long interval of time after this, the aforesaid venerable abbot Mummolinus was advanced, by the bestowal of divine grace, to the bishopric of the city of Noyon, and for twenty-six years duly governed the people of the aforesaid city entrusted to him by the Lord ^d. The glorious pontiff Audomarus therefore, after Mummolinus, set blessed Bertin over the holy choir of monks in the aforesaid monastery: for blessed Bertin was beloved and dear to the holy brethren serving God in that same place under the rigor of a strict Rule. For he was a venerable man, prudent in divine things, and a provident pastor of his flock, but in evil things simple and innocent, according to the Lord's precept: Be ye prudent as serpents, and simple as doves. But after this, with many ^e years intervening, B. Audomarus, losing his fleshly eyes, was deprived of the temporal light, that, enlightened with perpetual light, he might always look upon the Lord ^f, as B. David says: My eyes are ever toward the Lord; and the same says: To thee have I lifted up my eyes, who dwellest in the heavens. But after [\*] the loss of his fleshly eyes, filled with spiritual light, he governed the people entrusted to him by the Lord in the same order.

[15] and then, seized by sickness, he piously dies: But after this, with a few ^g years intervening, when the aforesaid old man Audomarus of venerable life had been wearied by the excessive heat of a fever, and when he had learned that the day of his death was at hand, on that same ^h day he rose from the little bed in which he lay, and, entering the church, prostrate before the altar [\] he prayed with tears to the Lord for himself and for the people standing about him. And communicating the Body and Blood of Christ, and preaching to the throngs surrounding him, with his eyes lifted to heaven, and his trembling hands stretched out as fever and old age shook him, he blessed his disciples ⁱ with devout mind, saying: I beseech the immense clemency of the almighty Lord, that I may deserve to see you, my little sons, happy in the kingdom of God.* And when all these things had been duly performed on the same day, he returned again to his little bed, and lying on it ^k with his whole body stretched out in the accustomed manner, and with serene countenance, the soul of his holy Confessor, surrounded by throngs of angels, went forth to the almighty Lord ^l. And those who at that same hour were present in that house testified that such an odor entered their nostrils and mouths as though that house had been full of all spices, as has often happened at the departure of other Saints. For precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.

[16] And the aforesaid venerable abbot Bertin, by divine grace revealing it to him, he is buried by S. Bertin. at once going with his monks to the place where the venerable old man died, brought the sacred body of B. Audomarus with psalms and hymns and canticles to the place of burial, and they buried him in the aforesaid church ^m, which that blessed Pontiff built at Sithiu, with immense mourning of the people standing about. But saint [\] Audomarus had foretold to blessed Bertin, and to all the brethren serving the Lord at that time at Sithiu, that when the uncertain lot [\] of the last hour should befall him, they should bury his poor body in the aforesaid place.

[17] At a short interval of time therefore, after the body of the venerable Man had been buried in the aforesaid place, Oil from the lamp above the sepulcher, and healings. beside his sepulcher, from a lamp hanging above it, filled with divine light, there dripped for long spaces of years a light-giving oil. And in this it appears to those who diligently consider the divine clemency how great glory his blessed confessor Audomarus has [\] in the sight of the eternal king, since beside his venerable sepulcher he has often until now shown glorious signs. For many wearied by various sicknesses, when they come to the tomb of B. Audomarus, by the bestowal of divine grace receive sudden health. For the almighty Lord not only accomplished [\] glorious powers through his Servants while they enjoy this life, but after their happy death does not cease to glorify them with signs and powers in divers parts of the world, as through his aforesaid holy confessor Audomarus he wrought many powers after his death, which, with the Lord's favor, we shall narrate in the following discourse.

[18] At a short space therefore passed after B. Audomarus' death, When someone had received a sum of money from another as a loan, a certain man, kindled with the heats of avarice and (as is reported) full of depraved manners, came to his gossip ⁿ, asking of him that he would lend him one silver solidus until an appointed time, testifying also by his crafty faith that at the appointed time he would restore it to him again. But the other, believing his gossip with a simple mind, gave [\] the silver to his crafty friend who begged it. And when a few days had passed, he came to him at the appointed time, saying: Restore to me my silver, which I lent thee: for the appointed time of thy promise has come. Then the false friend, looking at him with grim eyes, and speaking harsh words with him, with bold mind swore in denial that he had never received any scruple ^o from him. Then he who had lent the aforesaid solidus answered with right reason, saying: Let us go together to the venerable sepulcher of blessed Audomarus the confessor of Christ, that thou mayest there confirm to me by swearing through the glorious merits of that same Pontiff [and when he denied it, swearing by the merits of S. Audomarus, he is presently punished.] what thou here strivest to deny.*

[19] Then that wretch, blinded by love of mortal gain, and strengthened also by the prince of lying [\], the devil, who was a liar from the beginning and stood not in the truth, with frenzied mind set out on the road to go to the basilica of B. Audomarus, prepared also, persevering in his wickedness, to accomplish his perjury. Then both, speaking harsh words between themselves, journeying by one road to the venerable basilica of B. Audomarus, drew near to it as they beheld it. Then he who was demanding the solidus said to his gossip: What need is there for us to approach nearer to the basilica of B. Audomarus? For God is everywhere present; swear to me in this place in which we stand, by the merits of B. Audomarus, that thou didst not receive the solidus lent by me.* Then that wicked man, stretching out his hands, and moving his tongue to utter the perjury, and lifting his eyes to the basilica of B. Audomarus, suddenly, struck by divine vengeance, fell prostrate to the ground, and his eyes burst in that same moment: and after this, life being granted him for two days, namely for the terrifying of others who saw him in such distress, on the third day he died a most wretched death.

[20] [A miracle obtained in his lifetime: and miracles afterward wrought in the same place.] There is then another miracle, which is not doubted to have been done through the merits of B. Audomarus, and which to the present day is declared by sure signs, by the working of divine power. On a certain day, while he was going from the city of Thérouanne to the neighboring places, and when at the midday hours he had wished to grant a small space of rest to his poor body, he lay down under a certain tree not far from the farm [\] which is called Cornaccus [p]. But when the venerable Man had awakened, he at once hewed a wooden cross, and fixed it in the aforesaid tree under which he had lain: and on the following night in that same place in which the holy Confessor of Christ had lain, an immense light appeared; and all dwelling round about that place, seeing this miracle, said: This place too therefore now shines with such a light, because it was consecrated and blessed by B. Audomarus resting there a little while on the preceding day.* And to the present day many sick receive health in that same place, by the bestowal of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom is honor and glory with the Father and the Holy Spirit through eternal ages of ages. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

p. The name of this place I find variously written. In our Ms. Cornaccus: in Mabillon and in the Cambrai transcript Orneacus: in all the transcripts of the second Life Jorniacus: and finally in the third Life Jornacus. Malbrancq, book 3, chap. 36, treating of the event here related, writes of the place: It is a village distant four miles from Thérouanne and Renty, whose name is even now Journi. Whether that explanation is certain I do not know; but I cannot give a surer one. Malbrancq also adds that Jornacum was on that occasion given to S. Audomarus, about which I have more doubt, because that writer asserts more donations than I can hold all for certain.

\ Ebertramnus* he is called in Mab.

\* this word is omitted in the Ms.

\ al. ædificarent*

\ ibid. ad*

\ al. tenendo*

\ al. Sithiu*

\ Mab. Per*

\ ibid. altare*

\ al. enim*

\ Mab. mors*

\ al. habet*

\ al. perficit*

\ al. præstitit*

\ al. mendaci*

\ Mab. a villa*

ANOTHER LIFE

From four Mss. collated with one another

Audomarus bishop conf., at the villa of Wavrans near Saint-Omer in Artois (S.)

BHL Number: 0765, 0767

By an Anonymous writer.

PREFACE.

Since the venerable memory of the holy fathers is to be recalled with veneration to the praise of almighty God, and their honorable life is faithfully to be set forth [\*] for the example of the faithful; I do not think it incongruous, but rather fitting, that of the venerable bishop Audomarus' life and quality of conduct, of his many and very many nourishing deeds, we should at least recall a few to memory, as by the Lord's bounty we are able to remember them, so that, set down on pages, they may be made manifestly known.

\ in one Ms. præferenda*

CHAPTER I.

The Saint's country and parents: his monastic life: his episcopate, and his deeds in both states: his blessed death and burial.

Sprung of a noble family near Constance, This holy pontiff Audomarus therefore was sprung of noble and renowned parents according to the dignity of the world, and instructed in the Catholic faith, in the region of Constance, and not far from the city of Constance: and he was born particularly in that place which is called Aurea-vallis. His father, illustrious among his own people, was called Friulf, and his mother was named Domitta. And these religious parents were rearing the aforesaid Boy from the cradle in ecclesiastical discipline, according to the rite of the Christian religion, by the favor of divine grace: for they had him as their only son. But Friulf, after the death of his aforesaid wife, and as the Boy grew in age and in grace, with divine grace and mercy urging him, and with his son Audomarus encouraging and persuading him, strove to submit himself to the sweet and light yoke of Christ.

[3] with his father Friulf he makes for Luxeuil, Both therefore, namely the father Friulf with his son Audomarus, fulfilling what is written, Go, sell all that thou hast, and give to the poor, and follow me, and thou shalt have eternal life; dead to the world, alive to God, poor in fleeting things, rich in everlasting ones, subject to God, rebels against the devil, unlike in age, alike in mind, went on to the monastery of the soldiers of Christ which by its famous name is called Luxeuil, situated in the vast wilderness of the Vosges ^a, and which was founded in the name of God in the region of Burgundy by a man of holy memory, an Irishman, blessed Columbanus the abbot. To saint Eustasius the abbot therefore, who then presided over the holy and blessed multitude of monks in the aforesaid monastery, Audomarus with his father made known his religious desires, following what is written: Ask thy father, and he will declare to thee; thy elders, and they will tell thee. And saint Eustasius, perceiving that they burned in the love of God, and recognizing that in blessed Audomarus' countenance and words there had been divine grace, gave to the aforesaid servants of God salutary and perfect counsel according to the authority of holy Scripture, urging both, sometimes together, sometimes separately, that they should persevere with him under regular discipline in the service of God.

[4] and with him becomes a monk: then, Friulf being dead, Audomarus Both therefore, burning with divine love, following the counsel of their spiritual father Eustasius, submitted themselves with devout mind under the yoke of the holy Rule. Blessed Eustasius therefore, filled with immense joy, at once joined them to the holy fellowship of the monks. Thereupon saint Audomarus, full of spiritual grace, tender in age, robust in faith, subject to the strict rigor of the Rule, was trained among the holy people of the monks. He was beloved, by the persuasion of divine grace, by all the soldiers of Christ dwelling in the aforesaid monastery: for he was chaste in mind and in body, filled with obedience and humility, learned in divine knowledge, full of charity and gentleness, chastened with the strict fasts of frugality, wakeful in the long vigils of the nights, knowing what is written: Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching. And when for several years they had alike led their life under the monastic manner of living with the honorable worship of religion, Friulf, according to what he had professed, laudably persevered as a religious monk to the end ^b.

[5] becomes bishop of Thérouanne, and converts the gentiles Thereafter the fame of blessed Audomarus, spread abroad through many places, came to the knowledge of Dagobert king of the Franks; for a city set upon a mountain cannot be hidden. After this, with many years intervening, being called by the aforesaid most reverend prince and by the whole people of the Franks, with saint Acharius bishop of the city of Noyon helping, he received with great humility of mind the episcopal honor, for the teaching and governing of the people of the city of Thérouanne. In which rank, sowing the divine word in the hearts of believers, healing the sicknesses of souls and bodies, redeeming captives and those in chains, having care of widows and of the needy above all, he duly governed the people entrusted to him by the Lord. The aforesaid people of Thérouanne therefore, although before the coming of blessed Audomarus they had heard the divine word from the companions of saint Lucian ^c the martyr, namely from Fuscianus and Victoricus, at the same time in which saint Quintinus was preaching at Amiens, yet many of those men of Thérouanne still clung to the worship of idols.

[6] But after the two aforesaid blessed men, Fuscianus and Victoricus, to the Christian faith. went on from the aforesaid city of the men of Thérouanne, and were crowned with martyrdom in the city of the men of Amiens, then the men of Thérouanne returned again to the worship of idols: for not only those who before had been unwilling to receive the name of the Lord, but also those who had been baptized by the aforesaid fathers, seduced by a like error, worshipped idols. The aforesaid chief pontiff Audomarus therefore, entering that same city, delivered the salutary precepts of the divine word to the stolid hearts of the pagans, and enlightened with the abundant light of the Gospel their savage minds, blinded by the foul darknesses of ignorance; and, destroying the vain images, delivered them to the fire, and utterly overthrew the sacrilegious worship of idols in the aforesaid city: he converted all the people dwelling in it to the Catholic faith, with divine grace favoring him: for with everyone that works good, God works together; for if, as the Apostle testifies, God be for us, who is against us?

[7] But after the aforesaid Pontiff had converted the aforesaid people to the worship of the true God, The Saint, famous for miracles, when he was at Boulogne, preaching the divine word to the throngs flocking to him from every side, and delivering many in the name of God from various sicknesses, the divine bounty granted him signs of great powers, of which the following discourse now hastens, with Christ's favor, to set forth a few, from among his nourishing virtues. On a certain day Audomarus, the excellent confessor of Christ, in the city of Boulogne, rising at dawn after the nocturnal vigils in his accustomed manner, entered the church to pray, and there, through the long space of the day, preaching the word of God to the throngs standing about, and chanting Mass for the Christian people, and laying hands on the sick with various kinds of diseases, at the midday hour the Old man of venerable life laid himself down wearied upon his bed, wishing thereupon to grant a small space of rest to his poor body wearied with many labors. One of his attendant servants, wanton in his youthful [\] age, came to him, and asked leave of him to set out as far as the neighborhood of the sea. Then the Old man said to the youth who asked before the crowd: Do not, he said, my son, go thither, but sit here a little while, until I, with Christ's favor, rise from sleep*: for the provident Watchman of his flock, full of the prophetic spirit, foresaw that it would be an evil thing for the youth who asked to depart. Then the weary Old man, lulled by sleep, thus fell silent.

[8] But the youth, scorning the commands of his holy Patron — for it is the custom of the young to scorn the orders of the old — a certain youth, having entered a boat without his leave, is imperiled at sea, despising his Master's precept, hastened to the sea. Then, seeing a small boat standing on the shore, in which men had been accustomed to cross the neighboring ^d river, which the inhabitants in those parts name the Helna, the youth, blinded by love of sport, rashly climbed alone into it, wishing to play between the banks of this little stream. But the sea snatched him away by the strong force of the wind. Then suddenly a savage tempest rises on the deep, and that very boat, shaken by the swelling waves, having neither rudder nor helmsman, wandering here and there with the billows, came out upon that sea which with a great gulf separates Britain from the Franks. But the wretch, when he sees neither his own land nor any other, repented that he had scorned the words of his Teacher; he believed that he was dying, with the winds and the waves fighting: for neither the ship nor the youth could withstand the deep. Then God, at his prayer through the merits of Audomarus, straightway brought him to the Saxon ^e land.

[9] but, calling upon God through the merits of S. Audomarus, he escapes unharmed. Hence again, stupefied at beholding unknown fields, fearing that he would be a prey to robbers, confessing his fault of disobedience, with tears abundantly poured out, with earnest voice he calls upon Audomarus as his patron, and trusting in the Lord, quickly runs back to his ship. And with a blast of winds accompanying him, by the wonderful dispensation of almighty God, he returned [\] unharmed with the utmost swiftness at the same hour to the shore, at the place already named from which he had set out. The sailor, rising and recognizing the familiar fields, in penitence runs back to his Patron, finding the Bishop still staying in that place in which he had before left him lulled in sleep. Then, drawing near to the doorposts of the hall where the Old man was praying, prostrate many times upon the ground, confessing his fault with weeping, he begged pardon with tearful voice. But he, gently rebuking him, said: Did I not, my son, forbid thee to go as far as the sea? Why then hast thou shown thyself disobedient? But he said: I have sinned, Father, forgive me: and he related to him the whole order of his story, which he had gone through under compulsion. But the venerable Father admonished him, saying: This word, my son, never utter from thy mouth, nor declare to any man that this befell thee by my power, while I enjoy this brief life, lest the devil overcome us by the fault of boasting: for we ought not to seek praise from the mouth of men, lest vain glory lift our heart on high. Give thanks rather to the almighty Lord, who delivered thee from so great a peril, and brought thee back unharmed.* But he, after the death of the aforesaid Father, showing everything in order, narrated to all what he had suffered in the waves.

[10] A temptation of the flesh overcome: At another time also, when the Soldier of God, as was his custom, was entreating the Lord with sacred prayers in the hours of the night, at the instigation of the ancient enemy so great a provoking temptation of the flesh was sent upon him as the holy Man did not remember ever to have had. When suddenly, regarded by grace from above, he came back to himself, and, remembering the example of the burning of blessed Benedict ^f, having stripped himself of every covering of the body, he went out and at once cast himself upon the stings of nettles and briars, and there, having rolled long, he came out wounded in his whole body. And when he burned well and painfully without, he extinguished what was burning unlawfully within.

[11] A prodigious event. There is also another miracle ^g which is not doubted to have been wrought through the merit of blessed Audomarus; when he was once going from the city of Thérouanne to the neighboring places on a visitation, and had come to a certain place on a level plain ^h beside the summit of a certain hill, at [\*] whose foot lies the valley-farm which is called Jorniacus. And when at the midday hour he wished to grant a small space of rest to his poor body, he lay down there under a certain tree: and when the Athlete of Christ had risen from sleep, he fixed a cross of the Lord, made of wood, in the tree under which he had lain. And on the following night, with God's power working together, many lights ⁱ appeared in that same place: and from that time Christ, on behalf of his Soldier, healed there the infirmities of many, and declared innumerable powers ^k.

[12] But to increase the heap of his merits, for very many years before his death he lost the light of his temporal eyes: The Saint becomes blind, and so, blind outwardly and inwardly enlightened wholesomely by the Lord, day and night for this cause like a new Israelite he saw God, and the excellent Pontiff, placed in tribulation and set in the prison of the body, with ever devout heart said to the Lord: To thee have I lifted up my eyes,

who dwellest in the heavens: and not only this, but moreover after the rite of the high priest Melchisedech he offered the Sacrifice ^l daily to the Most High.

[13] When now the most blessed Audomarus knew that his death was near at hand, he falls sick, and piously dies: on the very last ^m day of his life he rose from the bed in which he lay seized by a fever, and, entering the church, prayed at length with tears. Then, going up to the altar of the Lord, he celebrated Mass, as had been his custom, and offered the sacred hosts to almighty God for all the people committed to him, making peace with all who were there present round about, and communicated with his own holy hands ⁿ all the clergy and all the disciples whom he governed with the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ: moreover he poured out abundantly upon them the word of preaching. And after an admonition delivered at very great length, he gave the longed-for blessing upon their heads, bidding them farewell and saying: My little sons, I beseech you, pray for me, that I may deserve to see you happy in the kingdom of God. These things being accomplished, he returned to his own bed, and, stretched out in the whole body after the manner of the dead, with hands raised to heaven, before them all he began to give immense thanks to almighty God, to praise and to bless him. And amid these words that holy soul went forth from the body with great joy and exultation, with a countenance exceedingly bright. And they testified to us ^o who were present at that time that so great a fragrance of odor was sprinkled in that house at the passing of that holy soul, as if that house had been full of all spices.

[14] But his body was translated by the most reverend abbot Bertin and the choir of monks, his body buried by S. Bertin. and buried with glory in the monastery of Sithiu, in the basilica which that illustrious Pontiff himself had built in honor of the holy Mother of God Mary for the entombing of the bodies of the monks. For saint Audomarus had asked blessed Bertin, and all the brethren serving the Lord at that time at Sithiu, in the granting of a certain privilege, that if anywhere the uncertain lot of the last hour should befall him, they should bring and bury his poor body in the aforesaid place among the bodies of the monks.

ANNOTATIONS.

\ al. juvenilis*

\ remeavit*

\ read ad*

CHAPTER II.

Miracles wrought after his death.

[ ] Miracles in general: a certain man denying his debt, After his death, at his venerable tomb, oil is seen to have dripped wonderfully by God's power from above from the hanging lamps ^a: and moreover many sick daily obtain health; and very many other miracles the Lord has deigned to show there through his Servant, of which, with the Lord's favor, we shall narrate in the following discourse. Not long after his death there was a certain man wicked in depraved manners, and kindled with the iniquity of avarice, who had borrowed one silver solidus from his gossip, joined to him from the sacred font: and afterward, breaking faith, he was utterly unwilling to restore it to him: but still further, to increase the heap of his own damnation, he denied with an oath what he had received, saying that he had never received it from him.

[16] But he who was demanding the loan answered: Swear then to me over the body of blessed Audomarus the pontiff what thou affirmest in denying, [and swearing falsely by the merits of S. Audomarus, he is at once grievously punished] and I acquiesce in the ground of thy oath and denial. But he said: I will do it whenever thou wilt. An agreement being made, they go together, and when they had drawn near to the sacrosanct place appointed, and were standing in the middle of the road near his basilica, he who was demanding the solidus said: What need have we to go further; God is everywhere: for all things stand in faith: in this place, he said, in which we stand together, lift up thy hands toward this most sacred temple, and swear to me by the merits and powers of that Saint, that thou didst neither receive from me that solidus which I demand of thee [\], nor art thou bound to be my debtor to pay it.* And when he with bold heart, the devil urging him, had lifted his hands to the oath, straightway divine vengeance followed, and by God's just judgment providing it, in the place in which he stood both his eyes burst in a moment: and after this, life being granted him for two days only, namely for the terrifying of others who had seen him in such distress, on the third day he died a most wretched death.

[17] At no long lapse of time passing after the burial of the body of the blessed Man, the chains of a captive loosed at the sepulcher: it happened that certain men dragging along an accused man, whose neck ^b and hands an iron chain encircled, had their passage before the basilica in which the Servant of our Lord Jesus Christ is known to be entombed. And when they drew near the place where the entrance of the temple lies open, the chained man, slipping from the hands of his captors, made in flight for the places adjoining the sacred sepulcher: and suddenly, amid the groans of a grieving mind and the weeping of a wearied body, by the will of almighty God, with the merits of saint Audomarus interceding, the man in chains appeared both rescued and his chain broken ^c. Then the aforementioned tormentors, following the tracks of the criminal, when they saw what had been done, remained a long while in exceeding astonishment. But recognizing that he had been saved by the merits of the Saint of God, and daring to do nothing else, they let him go away unharmed ^d.

[18] As the fame of the Man of God grew with these and such signs of powers, [donations made to the church of S. Audomarus: a thief in the vineyard of that church suddenly punished;] many nobles, not only from the nearest but also from the most distant regions of the lands, solemnly delivered estates ^e, vineyards and households with entire farms to the place of his tomb, a writing of charters having been made with the stipulation of suitable witnesses. Among whom certain Franks also, not far from the river Rhine, burning with the same vow and desire, confirmed the assignment of their fields and vineyards also to the holy Man. On a certain day therefore, at the time of vintage, a certain shepherd boy of a certain religious man, Ekkinus ^f by name, entered a vineyard bestowed upon the glorious Man, and by stealing filled his bosom with grapes; and this done, he returned with his booty to his companions. And when his companions asked him to share with them the booty which he had brought, as he put his right hand into his bosom both hands so clung motionless that neither the left, with which the bosom was held clasped, nor the right, put into the bosom, could be turned away; and, his mouth being twisted backward, he had lost the use of his tongue. Then, as the rest of his companions stood amazed, they led the crippled boy to his own master, relating with no small fear the cause of what had happened to him.

[19] [and afterward he, a suppliant with his master, is healed by the patronage of S. Audomarus.] But the boy's master, since he was a religious man, grieving with the boy, at once sought the help of the divine mercy. Taking with him the wretched and negligent boy, and also a bucket full of wine acquired by his own labor, and taking with him besides other various gifts, he went to the basilica of that same farm, which in their tongue is called Gebuvaldas-thorp,

carrying to the altar what he was carrying, and, prostrate with face bent down together with the boy, with weeping for the crime committed he asks the clemency of the Almighty, with the pious pontiff Audomarus interceding: and after the tears of humility the prayer obtained its effect: for the boy rose up sound, and the framework of his limbs was recalled to its former office. And the boy's master added yearly gifts [\*], promising that he would fulfill there what he had brought. And these things being thus accomplished, giving thanks to God he returned to his own house: and so it came about that thereafter the inhabitants of that place not only were unwilling to seize the goods of his monastery by invading vineyards or fruit trees or gardens, but did not even presume to touch the least blade of grass without leave. O wonderful Man, who, patient in the punishing of crimes, is proved easily to grant mercy to him who humbly entreats him.

[20] A little girl fallen into a very deep well, Nor only this power which we have said was wrought in a more distant province did the Lord accomplish for the making known of the holy Man's merits, but also in most recent time ^g a stupendous miracle was made known before our eyes. Of which almost innumerable witnesses of both sexes, of men and of women, still remain, who were present at this spectacle. At a certain time, as is the yearly custom throughout all provinces where the Christian religion holds the vigor of firmness, the rogations of three days were being solemnly celebrated, so that at the often-named temple, which is venerated with the greatest honor of this province, where also the body of that blessed Man is seen to have been given to the earth, with the people flocking together in throngs from every side, after the hour of midday Mass was to be [\*] celebrated for the wearied people in the procession returning also to that same basilica. Among whose multitude a certain woman was coming with two little girls, her daughters: but as the cantor was beginning the antiphon, the younger complained to the elder that she was wearied with the burning of thirst; with whom the elder, out of affection, had compassion, and, taking the hand of the younger, led her into the church ^h, that she might in some way relieve the little one's thirst. They came therefore together to a well of not less than sixty feet in depth. But when the means of drawing water was lacking, because the rope was absent, the little girl, for the sake of the water, looking down at so great a depth, incautiously slipped to the bottom.

[21] But the elder, who remained astonished over the mouth of the well, is drawn out of it unharmed. not knowing a more useful counsel, yet chattering and wailing, compelled a very great multitude to come by her voice. When therefore the girl, crying out, saw them running together on every side, scarcely for excessive grief did she disclose the cause of her wailing: and since the rope of the well was lacking, an intolerable anguish was not lacking, as to how or by what art they could draw out the body or the dead girl from the depth of the well. Then a servant of a certain brother of that monastery, running up, while he inquires into the matter that had happened, ran across to another well, and, a rope having been snatched from thence, went down into the well, and found the girl floating upon the water [\*] after the manner of a goose: nor were her very garments wetted by the depth of so great a fall: and with dry head too she was brought up to the top. Which the multitude seeing, they glorified God through the merits of the sacred Pontiff, knowing without doubt that by the aid of his prayers they would be delivered from the punishments of hell, if they confess their sins from the heart.

[22] These things concerning the manner of life and the virtues of the most holy prelate Audomarus we have touched upon ⁱ in a brief discourse. The writer's epilogue, in which he adds the years of the episcopate. For the rest, let the reader know that a very great forest of his virtues lies hidden from us, which partly the negligence of earlier writers, and some things the judgment of moderns has passed over in silence, on account of the weariness of readers. Let these suffice meanwhile; since many times at his venerable sepulcher the healing of divers sick persons is beheld. If the heap of all these were committed to a volume, the codex would be reckoned more burdensome to the reader than necessary. And he ruled the church for the space of thirty ^k years, and, these being completed, at the last hour of his laying down, with a multitude of weeping disciples standing about, on the V of the Ides of September, full of the Holy Spirit, he passed to Christ: whose body was translated by saint Bertin, and buried in the monastery of Sithiu ^l, our Lord Jesus Christ reigning, to whom with God the Father and the Holy Spirit is honor, power and magnificence through all ages of ages. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

\* i.e. having been received

\ a te*

\* i.e. gifts

\ debeat*

\ aquæ*

THE THIRD LIFE

by an anonymous author,

From our manuscript codex, collated with other Mss.

Audomarus bishop conf., at the villa of Wavrans near Saint-Omer in Artois (S.)

BHL Number: 0768, 0769, 0771

By an Anonymous writer.

CHAPTER I.

The Saint's country, parents, monastic life, episcopate, conversion of the gentiles, miracles wrought.

[ ] The Saint's country, parents, pious upbringing: The holy ^a pontiff Audomarus therefore was sprung of noble and renowned parents according to the dignity of the world, and instructed in the Catholic faith, in the region of Constance, and not far from the city of Constance, and he was born particularly in that place which is called Aurea-vallis. And his father, illustrious among his own people, was called Friulf, and his mother was named Domitta. And these religious parents were rearing the aforesaid Boy from the cradle according to the rite of the Christian Religion, by the favor of divine grace, in Ecclesiastical disciplines: for they had Audomarus as their only son. But Friulf, after the death of his aforesaid wife, as the Boy grew in age and in grace, with divine grace urging him, and with his son Audomarus encouraging and persuading him, strove to submit himself to the sweet and light yoke of Christ.

[2] Both therefore, namely the father Friulf with his blessed son Audomarus, he goes with his father Friulf to Luxeuil, fulfilling what is written: Go, sell all that thou hast, and give to the poor, and follow me; and thou shalt have eternal life; dead to the world, alive to God, poor in fleeting things, rich in everlasting ones, subject to God, rebels against the devil, unlike in age, alike in mind, went on to the monastery of the soldiers of Christ which by its famous name is called Luxeuil, and which was founded in the name of God in the region of Burgundy by a man of holy memory, an Irishman, blessed Columbanus the abbot. To saint Austasius the abbot therefore, who then presided over the holy and blessed multitude of monks in the aforesaid monastery, Audomarus with his father with one accord make known their religious desires, following what is written: Ask thy father, and he will declare to thee; thy elders, and they will tell thee. And he, perceiving that they burned with the love of God, and recognizing that in blessed Audomarus' countenance and words divine grace had been present, gave to the aforesaid Servants of the Lord salutary and perfect counsel according to the authority of holy Scripture, urging both, sometimes together, sometimes separately, that they should persevere with him under Regular discipline in the service of God.

[3] Both therefore, burning with divine love, following the counsel of their spiritual father Austasius, and with him becomes a monk under abbot Eustasius: submitted themselves with devout mind to the yoke of the holy Rule. Blessed Austasius therefore, filled with immense joy, joined them to the holy fellowship of the monks. And when for several years they lived alike under the monastic life with honorable observance, Friulf, according to what he had professed, persevered to the end a religious monk. Thereupon saint Audomarus, full of spiritual grace, tender in age, robust in faith, subject to the strict vigor of the Rule, trained in Regular discipline among the holy people of the monks, was beloved, by the persuasion of divine grace, by all the soldiers of Christ dwelling in the aforesaid monastery: for he was chaste in mind and in body, filled with obedience and humility, learned in divine knowledge, full of charity and gentleness, strict in frugality, chastened with fasts, wakeful in the long vigils of the nights, knowing what is written: Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching.

[4] Meanwhile the fame of blessed Audomarus, spread abroad through many places, then created bishop of Thérouanne, the Morini as far as Dagobert of the Franks

the king came to knowledge: for a city set upon a mountain cannot be hidden. After this, with many years intervening, being called by the aforesaid most reverend king Dagobert and by the whole people of the Franks, with saint Acharius bishop of Noyon helping, he received with great humility of mind the episcopal honor, for the teaching and governing of the people of the city of Thérouanne. In which rank, sowing the divine word in the hearts of believers, healing the sicknesses of souls and bodies, redeeming captives and those in chains, having care of widows and of the needy above all, he duly governed the people entrusted to him by the Lord. The aforesaid people of Thérouanne therefore, although before the coming of saint Audomarus they had heard the divine word from the companions of Dionysius the martyr, namely from Fuscianus and Victoricus, at the same time in which saint Quintinus was preaching in the city of Amiens, yet many of those men of Thérouanne still clung to the worship of idols. For after the two aforesaid blessed men, Fuscianus and Victoricus, went on from the aforesaid city of the men of Thérouanne and were crowned with martyrdom in the territory of the men of Amiens, then the men of Thérouanne returned again to the worship of idols. For not only those who before had been unwilling to receive the name of the Lord, but also those who had been baptized by the aforesaid fathers, led by a like error, worshipped idols.

[5] he converts to the Catholic faith. Saint Audomarus the pontiff therefore, entering that same city, delivered the salutary precepts of the divine word to the stolid hearts of the pagans, and illumined with the abundant light of Gospel preaching their savage minds, blinded by the foul darknesses of ignorance: the vain images too, destroying them, he delivered to the fire, and utterly overthrew the sacrilegious worship of idols in the aforesaid city: and he converted all the people dwelling in it to the Catholic faith, with divine grace favoring him. For with everyone that works good, God works together: for if, as the Apostle testifies, God be for us, who is against us? But after the aforesaid Pontiff had converted the aforesaid people to the worship of the true God, preaching the divine word to the throngs flocking to him from every side, and delivering many in the name of God from various sicknesses, the divine bounty granted him signs of great powers, of which the following discourse, with Christ's favor, hastens to set forth a few.

[6] When a certain youth, against the Saint's will, On a certain day Audomarus, the excellent confessor of Christ, staying in the city of Boulogne, rising at dawn after the nocturnal vigils in his accustomed manner, entered the church, and there, through the long space of the day, preaching the word of God to the throngs standing about, and singing Mass for the Christian people, and laying hands on the sick with various kinds of diseases, at the midday hours the Old man of venerable life betook himself wearied to his bed. Then, when he was granting a small space of rest to his poor body wearied with many labors, one of his attendant servants, wanton in his youthful age, came to him, saying: Lord, grant me now thy leave, that I may go to the places near the sea. To whom the Saint answered with prophetic mouth: You have not, my son, my leave ^b to go anywhere yet: for I think it better for thee to wait here a little while, until thou see me roused from sleep. For the provident Watchman of his flock foresaw the peril which would befall the erring youth. Then, lulled by sleep, the weary old man fell silent.

[7] went to the sea and entered a skiff; he is snatched by the wind into the sea: But the youth, scorning the commands of his blessed Patron — as it is the custom of the young to make little of the orders of the old — with swift steps went off to the sea. Then, seeing a small boat standing on the shore, in which the inhabitants had been accustomed to cross a small river, which in those parts is named the Helna, forgetful and rashly, and blinded too by love of sport, he climbed alone into it, wishing to play between the banks of this little stream. But a strong force of wind snatched him out to the open sea: then suddenly a savage tempest rose upon the deep, and the boat is shaken by the swelling waves: for having neither rudder nor helmsman, wandering here and there with the billows it was floating on that sea which with a great gulf separates Britain from the Franks, and in which the strongest ships are often wont to be sunk. And when the wretch could see neither his own land nor any other, he repented that he had scorned the words of his Teacher: for he believed that he was dying, with the winds and the waves fighting, since neither he himself nor the ship could withstand the deep: and presently the mercy of almighty God, at his prayer through the merits of saint Audomarus, brought him to the Saxon land.

[8] But he again, stupefied at beholding unknown fields, feared that he would become a prey to robbers [but calling upon God through the merits of S. Audomarus, he is delivered from a manifest peril;] if he waited there alone for any while. Hence confessing his known fault of disobedience, with tears abundantly poured out, he again asks the help of blessed Audomarus, and trusting in God quickly runs back to the ship. Then almighty God, the fury of the sea being suppressed, granted him a favorable wind: behold, the boat, floating again over a calm sea, is carried back unharmed to the same harbor from which a strong force of wind had before snatched it. And the sailor, rising up, at once recognized the familiar fields, and leaving his ship on the shore, gave thanks to almighty God: then the youth in penitence runs back as quickly as possible to his Patron; whom he found still praying in the same place in which he had before left him lulled in sleep: and straightway the wretch, prostrate on the ground, and confessing his fault of disobedience with tears poured out, begged pardon with humble voice. Whom the Old man gently rebuking said: Did I not, my son, forbid thee to go anywhere? Why then didst thou afterward despise thy Father's word? To whom the youth answered with trembling voice: My fault, Lord, truly my fault: pardon wretched me, delivered by thee from the peril of death.

[9] Then he began to narrate his perils — that alone amid the swelling billows of the Ocean, among the tall rocks, amid the surges of the meeting currents, in a small boat, he had suffered much: nor did he believe [as he himself, being bidden to be silent while the Saint lived, narrated after his death:] that he could escape alive, unless the omnipotence of the Lord, by the merits of saint Audomarus, had delivered him from death. Presently the blessed Prelate restrained the incautious disciple with humble mind, saying: Never utter this word again from thy mouth, so long as thou seest me enjoying this brief life; lest the devil overcome us by the fault of boasting: for neither ought we to seek praise from the mouth of men, lest our mind be lifted up with vain glory. These things the youth, terrified by the transgression of his former disobedience, kept silent during the life of the blessed Prelate: but after his death he set forth in order all that he had suffered in the waves.

[10] There is also another miracle which is not doubted to have been wrought by the merit of blessed Audomarus, a prodigy wrought in a tree. and which to the present day is declared by sure signs, by the working of divine power. On a certain day, while he was going from the city of Thérouanne to the neighboring places, and when at the midday hours he had resolved to grant himself a small space of rest, he lay down under a certain tree, not far from the farm which is called Jornacus. But when the venerable Man had awakened, he at once ordered a wooden cross to be hewn, and fixed it in the aforesaid tree under which he had lain. And on the following night in that same place in which the holy Confessor of Christ had lain, an immense light appeared, and all who saw the miracle said: This place therefore now shines with a light, because it was consecrated and blessed by blessed Audomarus resting there a little while on the preceding day: and to the present day ^c many sick receive health in that same place.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER II.

The Saint receives various gifts from Adroald, whom he had converted: a church founded at Sithiu: the coming of SS. Mummolinus and his companions, to whom he grants a place for founding a monastery: the Saint's miracles, blindness, sickness, death and burial.

[ ] He visits the farm of Sithiu received from Adroald, At a certain time therefore, while blessed Audomarus was going about the villages after the episcopal manner, he came to a certain village, Sithiu by name, a farm assigned to him already long since by a certain most devout man. For there was a certain powerful man, Adrowald by name, exceedingly rich in the vain riches of this world, whom blessed Audomarus converted from the error of heathenism to the Catholic faith, and whom with all his household he baptized. He, with prudent counsel scorning the deceitful riches of the present world, and having no son, had delivered ^a a great part of his inheritance with all his manifold substance to God and to blessed Audomarus, namely the farm mentioned above. In this therefore he received himself into lodging after his accustomed manner, having long since had the desire to found in it a church in the name of saint Martin. As therefore it is the custom of Saints to seek stolen prayers, rising secretly by night, while all were resting, he went out alone from the house ^b, and poured out a prayer to almighty God: and when he had prayed long and much, desiring that his intention should be fulfilled, he said: O blessed Martin, formerly an excellent priest, now joined to the choirs of the Saints, show me a place to be consecrated to divine worship in thy name.

[12] and builds a church in it. Scarcely had the Saint finished his prayer, when behold, a light fell from heaven in the manner of a candle upon that place where now the altar is set, which the Man of the Lord, gazing upon it for some while, carefully marked the place; and boldly approaching, he rendered praises and thanksgivings to the Lord; and fixing there his pastoral staff as a token of faith, he withdrew, and revisited his bed. But when morning came, the disciples, watchful and intent upon the service of the blessed Father, seeking his staff among themselves, did not find it: to whom blessed Audomarus said: Let us go to the place chosen by God and shown by the Lord's mercy to my littleness. With him going before, they presently came to where the staff was fixed. And as the disciples stood amazed, and wondered within themselves who had fixed it there, at once the Confessor of the Lord explained to them the whole order of the matter. Then he ordered a church to be built there, and dedicated it in honor of saint Martin ^c. But afterward he founded a monastery ^d not far from it, and consecrated it in honor of the holy Mother of God Mary, where now his body rests in peace.

[13] After this, at no long interval of time, there came to blessed Audomarus from the aforesaid region of Constance three men of one mind, [He receives SS. Mummolinus and his companions, and gives them a place for founding a monastery:] Mummolinus, Bertrannus and saint Bertin, together, leaving, according to the Lord's

precept, parents, country, and all their kinsfolk. But the holy Man received the aforesaid servants of God graciously, giving immense thanks to the almighty Lord, who had brought to him such helpers for preaching the Gospel. For the aforesaid men were perfect in the Catholic faith, and learned in ecclesiastical disciplines and in divine knowledge. A short space of time being thereafter passed, saint Audomarus with the aforesaid blessed men, with divine grace urging him, thought to found a monastery in God's name for monks to dwell in: and by the divine mercy bestowed upon him he had a fit place, namely in the aforesaid farm which Adrowald had given him. He granted them therefore that wherever in it they wished they should build a dwelling for monks. Saint Mummolinus therefore, Bertrannus and Bertin began to build a monastery in the place which to this day is called the Old monastery.

[14] But staying in that place a few years, they wished to choose another place. they afterward build another monastery at Sithiu The blessed men therefore, trusting in the mercy of the Lord, found a perfect counsel: for straightway going up into a ship without helmsman and without oarage, and without any care of their food and drink, sailing here and there on the spacious pool adjoining their aforesaid dwelling, they were asking the almighty Lord that he would bring them unharmed to the place which his mercy had prepared for them, saying to one another that they would not go up from the aforesaid pool save when, their little boat holding a fitting harbor, it should befall them to sing according to the order of the Psalter the following little verse: This is my rest for ever and ever, here will I dwell, for I have chosen it. The merciful Lord therefore, who is everywhere present to his servants — for he is nigh to all that call upon him in truth — brought the ship in which the aforesaid blessed men were, after some space, to land. Then they too, singing the aforesaid little verse, without delay leaving the ship, joyfully entered the harbor, recognizing also that that place had been delivered to them by the Lord.

[15] Thereupon, with blessed Audomarus piously favoring their desire, whose first abbot was Mummolinus, the second Bertin. they began to build in God's name a monastery named Sithiu, named from the aforesaid farm, upon the river Aa; and as religious men flocked together from every side to the aforesaid servants of God, blessed Audomarus set Mummolinus over the multitude of monks. But at no long interval of time after, the aforesaid venerable abbot Mummolinus was advanced, by the bestowal of divine grace, to the bishopric of the city of Noyon, and for twenty-six years governed the people of the aforesaid city entrusted to him by the Lord. The glorious pontiff Audomarus therefore, after Mummolinus, set blessed Bertin over the holy choir of monks in the aforesaid monastery: for blessed Bertin was beloved and dear to the holy brethren serving God in that same place: for he was a venerable man, prudent in divine things, and a provident pastor of his flock, simple and innocent according to the Lord's precept: Be ye prudent as serpents and simple as doves.

[16] A temptation, as is reported, overcome; At another time also, when the Soldier of God, as was his custom, was entreating the Lord with sacred prayers in the hours of the night, at the instigation of the ancient enemy so great a provoking temptation ^e of the flesh was sent upon him as the holy Man did not remember ever to have had the like. When suddenly, regarded by grace from above, he came back to himself: and, remembering the burning of blessed Benedict, having stripped himself of every covering of the body, he went out and at once cast himself amid the stings of nettles and briars, and there, having rolled long, he came out wounded in his whole body: and when he burned well and painfully without, he extinguished what was burning unlawfully within.

[17] sight restored to a blind boy, At a certain time, while blessed Audomarus was going about the churches of his bishopric, that he might snatch the sheep committed to him from the jaws of the raging enemy, it happened that he came to a farm named Kernas ^f. Now there was there a certain very rich man, who had built a church on that same farm of his possession, which no bishop had yet consecrated. He, when he heard of the coming of the blessed Prelate, ran to meet him with devout mind, asking that he would consecrate with the illumination of his blessing the church which he had built with pious devotion: to whose devout prayers the Saint began to assent. But while he was performing according to custom the mystery of the sacred dedication, there was born to that same man a son deprived of both eyes. And when the celebration of the Masses was finished, the father fell at the feet of the holy Prelate, making known to him the event of the matter, and at the same time begging with great weeping that he would wash his son with the wave of purification: but neither did the holy Confessor of Christ refuse these prayers. And when he was proceeding to the blessing of the font, water was altogether lacking for these mysteries. But saint Audomarus, greatly trusting in his Lord, lifted the staff which he held, and struck the ground, saying that the omnipotence of God is in all places; and, the staff being drawn back, at once brought forth from the earth a most pure fountain. This water therefore being consecrated to the mystery of regeneration, the aforesaid infant, immersed, is reborn a son of adoption, and the light which the day of his birth had denied him, the grace of holy regeneration brought him through the intercession of saint Audomarus.

[18] likewise to another: Hence again there was another like miracle, which is not doubted to have been wrought by the merits of that same kindly confessor Audomarus. At length, after the fame of his powers had resounded far and wide, while he was going about the villages of his diocese in his accustomed manner, he came into the district of Flanders, preaching the Gospel of the kingdom. And behold, a certain noble man, Adalfrid by name, received him on his inheritance which is situated upon the river Saltanawa ^g, serving him with all obedience of service, as befitted a holy Bishop. He too had a son blind from birth, three months old, not yet reborn in the sacred font: whom he humbly asked that the holy confessor of Christ Audomarus should baptize, hoping that he might also be able to receive the brightness of sight by the merits of him for whom the divine clemency was wont to show so many miracles among men: to whose petition the Saint of the Lord assented with a thankful mind. When therefore it came to the questioning of the renunciation according to the order of baptism — O wonderful omnipotence of God! — the three-month-old infant answered to the words of the questioning Bishop, and, being baptized, received the use of sight.

[19] But after this, with many years intervening, Audomarus, old and blind, with S. Autbert of Cambrai blessed Audomarus, losing his fleshly eyes, was deprived of the temporal light, that, enlightened with perpetual light, he might always look upon the Lord, as blessed David says: My eyes are ever toward the Lord: and again: To thee have I lifted up my eyes, who dwellest in the heavens. But after the loss of his fleshly eyes, filled with spiritual light, he duly governed the people entrusted to him by the Lord. But at that same time blessed Autbert ^h bishop of Cambrai, as we have learned by the relation of our elders, on a certain day after the matins hymns, at the reddening of dawn, saw far off across the little river which is called Crientio ⁱ a man exceedingly bright, holding a rod in his hand, and measuring out the site of a basilica. Which he beholding, by God's revelation recognized the vision to be angelic; and it was shown him that blessed Vedast was without doubt to be translated thither, with Christ's assent. Made more certain by which revelation, he invited to so great a work blessed Audomarus, the glorious bishop of the city of Thérouanne, who at those same times was held to be notable, and magnificent in Christ and wonderful in virtues: who, although already worn out with age, and seeming to have been made weaker by the loss of his sight, yet having his mind intent with spiritual zeal, at once ready, with Christ guiding his steps, came in haste to the venerable Autbert.

[20] And he, relating what he bore in mind and what had been shown him, [translates the body of S. Vedast: and having there received his sight, he asks for and obtains his former blindness.] with equal desire and common counsel, with great joy of the peoples who had flocked together from every side, they translated blessed Vedast to the appointed place. In the year therefore of the Lord's Incarnation six hundred and ninety-four ^k this translation was made, with Pope John the sixth ^l sitting in the Apostolic See, who after Sergius held the apostolate as the eighty-seventh from blessed Peter, with Childeric ^m reigning as king of the Franks. In which translation blessed Audomarus is reported to have received the light of his eyes; but at once by prayers to have obtained the same blindness which he had borne willingly ⁿ. For he made little of the light of fleshly eyes, who deserved the light of the citizens above. The venerable Pontiff and excellent Confessor of Christ, deprived of the fleshly light, was unwilling to see the vanity of this world, because, enlightened within by the ray of the true Sun, he clung to God with his whole mind, with his whole strength. Wherefore, beholding the departure of his happiness, how holily and how piously he passed from the world, we shall narrate in the following discourse.

[21] At the following time therefore, when the aforesaid old man Audomarus of venerable life had been wearied by an excessive burning, The Saint's last sickness, and pious death: and had learned that the day of his death was at hand, on the same day rising from the little bed in which he lay, and entering the church, prostrate before the altar he prayed with tears to the Lord for himself and for the people standing about; communicating the Body and Blood of Christ, with eyes lifted to heaven and his trembling hands stretched out as fever and old age shook him, he blessed his disciples with devout mind, saying: I beseech the immense clemency of the almighty Lord, that I may deserve to see you, my little sons, happy in the kingdom of God. And when all these things had been duly performed on the same day, he returned again to his little bed, and on it, with his whole body stretched out in the accustomed manner and with serene countenance, the soul of the holy Confessor, surrounded by throngs of angels, went forth to the almighty Lord, in the year of the Lord six hundred and ninety-five ^o.

[22] The sweet odor at his death, his burial. And those who at that same hour were present in that house testified that such an odor entered their nostrils and mouths as though that house had been full of all spices, as has often happened at the departure of other Saints. For precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his Saints. And the aforesaid venerable abbot Bertin, by divine grace revealing it to him, went with his monks to the place where the venerable Old man died, and brought the sacred body of blessed Audomarus with psalms and canticles to the place of burial, and they buried him in the aforesaid church, which that blessed Pontiff had built at Sithiu, with immense mourning of the people standing about. For saint Audomarus had foretold to blessed Bertin, and to all the brethren serving at that time at Sithiu, that when the uncertain lot of the last hour should befall him, they should bury his poor body in the aforesaid monastery.

ANNOTATIONS.

of the vision, and the other things that follow, seem the more fabulous in proportion as the humble Audomarus would the less have narrated them all to everyone, if they had happened. The Saint was in another's house; who then would believe that he went out secretly? Who rather does not see that he could not so go out from the house and return to it without many being aware of it?

CHAPTER III.

Various miracles of the Saint wrought after his death.

[ ] Oil flows from the lamp hanging above the sepulcher: At a short interval of time therefore, after the body of the venerable Man had been buried in the aforesaid place, beside his sepulcher, from a lamp hanging above it, filled by a divine gift, there dripped for long spaces of years a light-giving oil. And in this it appears to those who diligently consider the divine clemency how great glory his blessed confessor Audomarus has in the sight of the eternal King, since beside his venerable sepulcher he has often until now ^a shown glorious signs. For many wearied by various sicknesses, when they come to the tomb of blessed Audomarus, by the bestowal of divine grace receive sudden health: for the almighty Lord not only accomplishes glorious powers through his servants while they enjoy this life, but also after their happy death does not cease to glorify them with signs and powers in divers parts of the world, as through his aforesaid holy confessor Audomarus he wrought many powers after his death.

[24] a certain man unwilling to repay a loan, At a short space therefore passed after the death of blessed Audomarus, a certain man kindled with the heats of avarice, and full, as is reported, of depraved manners, came to his gossip, asking of him that he would lend him one silver solidus until an appointed time, testifying also by his crafty faith that at the appointed time he would return to him again. But the other with a simple mind gave the silver to his gossip who craftily begged it. And when a few days had passed, he came to him at the appointed time, saying: Restore to me my silver, which I lent thee: for the appointed time of thy promise has come. Then the false friend, looking at him with grim eyes, and speaking harsh words with him, with bold mind swore in denial that he had never [\] received any denarius from him. But he who had lent the aforesaid solidus answered with right reason, saying: Let us go together to the venerable sepulcher of blessed Audomarus the confessor of Christ, that thou mayest there confirm to me by swearing through the glorious merits of that same Pontiff what thou here strivest to deny.*

[25] and swearing falsely, he is suddenly and grievously punished: Then that wretch, blinded by love of mortal gain, and strengthened also by the prince of lying, the devil, who was a liar from the beginning and stood not in the truth, with frenzied mind set out on the road to go to the basilica of blessed Audomarus, prepared also, persevering in his wickedness, to accomplish his perjury. Both therefore, speaking harsh words between themselves, journeying by the same road, already beholding the venerable basilica of blessed Audomarus, drew near to it. Meanwhile he who was demanding the solidus said to his gossip: What need have we to approach nearer to the basilica of blessed Audomarus? For God is everywhere present. Swear therefore to me in this place in which we stand, by the merits of blessed Audomarus, that thou didst not receive the solidus lent by me. Then that wicked man, stretching out his hands, and moving his tongue to utter the perjury, and lifting his eyes to the basilica of blessed Audomarus, suddenly, struck by divine vengeance, fell prostrate to the ground, and his eyes burst in a moment: and after this, life being granted him for two days only, namely for the terrifying of others who saw him in such distress, on the third day he died a most wretched death.

[26] At no long lapse of time passing after the burial of the holy Man's poor body, a certain man freed from his chains in the Saint's church: it happened that certain men dragging along an accused man, whose neck and hands an iron chain encircled, had their passage before the basilica in which the Servant of our Lord Jesus Christ is known to be entombed; and they had already drawn near the place where the entrance of the temple lay open, when the chained man, slipping from the hands of his captors, made in flight for the places adjoining the sacred sepulcher, and suddenly, amid the weeping of a groaning and grieving mind and a wearied body, by the will of almighty God, with the merits of saint Audomarus interceding, the man in chains appeared both rescued and his chain broken. Then the aforementioned tormentors, following the tracks of the criminal, when they saw what had been done, remained a long while in exceeding astonishment: but recognizing that he had been saved by the merits of the Saint of God, and daring to do nothing else, they let him go away unharmed ^b, to the heaping up of his glory among men, who, while he enjoyed earthly life, had his conversation in the heavens.

[27] Fame spread abroad blessed Audomarus, renowned for such miracles, through the divers spaces of the world, estates given to the Saint: one stealing in his vineyard is punished; and faithful men burning in the veneration of this Saint, not only from the neighboring but also from the most distant regions of the lands, solemnly delivered estates, vineyards and households with entire farms to the place of his tomb, that they might deserve to have him as an intercessor with the just Judge, with the Lord favoring them, with the stipulation of suitable witnesses and a writing of charters. Among whom certain noble Franks also, a people known by the name of the Ripuarians ^c, not far from the river Rhine, burning with the same vow and desire, assigned also their fields and vineyards with the rest of their substance to the holy Man and to those who served him. But on a certain day, at the time of vintage, a shepherd boy, namely of a certain religious man, Ekkinus by name, entered a vineyard bestowed upon the glorious Man, and by stealing filled his bosom with grapes, and this done returned with his booty to his companions: and when they asked that he would share what he had stolen, as though kindly he prepared himself to distribute the booty. And when, opening it with his left hand, he tried to put his right hand into his bosom, presently both so clung motionless that neither the left, with which the bosom was held clasped, nor the one put into the bosom, could be drawn away: and, his mouth being twisted backward, he lost the use of his tongue: at which his companions marveling led the crippled boy to his own master with no small trembling, relating why this crippling had befallen him.

[28] But the boy's master, since he was religious and humble, but afterward, a suppliant at the sepulcher, he is healed. grieving with the ill-willed boy, at once sought the help of the divine mercy, and taking a bucket full of wine acquired by his own labor, and other various gifts, with devout mind he went with the boy to the basilica of that same farm, which in their tongue is called Gebuwaldestorp ^d, and, having offered at the altar what he had provided, he prostrated himself with face bent to the ground together with the crippled boy: and with pure heart and wet face he asks the clemency of the almighty Lord for the crime that had been committed, through the intercession of the most pious pontiff Audomarus: and presently after the tears of humility the prayer obtained its effect: for the boy rose up sound, and the framework of his limbs was recalled to its former office. And the boy's master added that he would fulfill yearly the gifts which he had brought, as long as he had life: and these things being thus accomplished, giving thanks to God he returned to his own house:

and so it came about that thereafter no one in that farm dared to seize by invasion not only the vineyards pertaining to saint Audomarus, or the fruits of the apple trees or the garden; but did not even presume to touch the last blade of grass without leave. O wonderful Man, who, patient in the punishing of crimes, is proved easily to grant mercy to him who humbles himself and entreats him.

[29] A little girl fallen into a well, Nor only this power which we have said was wrought in a more distant province had the Lord of powers accomplished for the making known of the holy Man's merits: but also in most recent time ^e a stupendous miracle was made known before our eyes, of which almost innumerable witnesses of both sexes, of men and of women, still remain, who were present at this spectacle. At a certain time, when according to the custom of the Christian Religion the rogations of three days were being celebrated, the peoples flocked together in throngs from every side in their accustomed manner to the basilica of saint Audomarus, which is venerated with the greatest honor above all in this province: and when after the midday hour Mass had to be celebrated [\*] for the wearied people in the procession, and returning to that same basilica, it happened that among the multitude a certain woman came with her two daughters, girls. But as the cantor was beginning the antiphon, the younger complained to the elder that she was wearied with the burning of thirst: with whose feeling her elder sister had compassion, and, taking the hand of the younger, led her into the church ^f, that she might in some way relieve the little one's thirst. They came therefore together to a well of not less than forty feet in depth. But when the means of drawing water was lacking, because the rope was absent, the little girl, for the sake of the water, looking down at so great a depth, incautiously slipped to the bottom.

[30] she floats upon the water, and is drawn out safe. But the elder, who remained astonished over the mouth of the well, not knowing a more useful counsel, yet chattering and wailing, compelled a very great multitude to come by her voice. When therefore they saw them running together on every side, the girl, scarcely crying out for fear, disclosed the cause of her wailing. And since the rope was lacking to the well, an intolerable anguish was not lacking, as to how or by what art even the dead body might be drawn out from the depth of the well. Then a servant of a certain brother of that monastery, running up, when he had inquired into the matter that had happened, ran across to another well, and, a rope having been snatched from thence, went down into the well, and found the girl swimming upon the water after the manner of a goose: nor were her garments now wetted throughout by the depth of so great a fall: but with dry head too she was brought up to the top. Which those who were present seeing, devoutly glorified God through the merits of the holy pontiff Audomarus, knowing without doubt that by the aid of his prayers they would be delivered from the punishments of hell, if they confess their sins from the heart.

ANNOTATIONS.

\ umquam*

\ debebat celebrari*

CHAPTER IV.

Abbot Hugh attempts to translate the Saint's body secretly; but S. Folquin the bishop, the matter being known, brings it back to Saint-Omer: another carrying of the body to Nijmegen, and its bringing back to its former place.

[ ] [Abbot Hugh attempts to carry the body of S. Audomarus to the monastery of saint Quentin,] Long after these things abbot Hugh ^a, a man in other respects praiseworthy, but in the present business struck by a diabolical arrow, began to devise how he might carry the body of saint Audomarus — by whose help and aid the people of Thérouanne is governed — to Vermandois, to the monastery of saint Quentin ^b, since he governed that too. But fearing the animosity of the common people, having gathered a multitude of the men of Vermandois, he attempts to drag it away by force, if perchance he could not do so secretly. Now there was a certain monk, Morus by name, guardian of the church of saint Audomarus, by whose counsel and prompting the aforesaid man came, and, taking the sacred body of our holy Prelate and Patron, carried it with his multitude as far as the farm named Liesburch ^c. But by the working of God's providence, they remained three days in the aforesaid farm with the consecrated body. Meanwhile it had happened that Folquin, the illustrious prelate of the city of Thérouanne, was going about the parishes of his bishopric after the episcopal manner, that, if anywhere anything were done against the statutes of the holy canons, the careful pastor might learn of it, and with such zeal came with pious carefulness as far as the cell called Wormoch ^d.

[32] but S. Folquin the bishop, having pursued him with his men, Meanwhile, when there they had come to table, at which most sumptuous services were being prepared, as for so great a pontiff, the brother ^e of that same blessed prelate flies to him, announcing a grave and irreparable ruin for the country, if it should be accomplished — namely that saint Audomarus had been carried off from his monastery, and, unless he quickly came to the rescue, was to be borne away to saint Quentin's at Vermandois. Hearing this, the holy priest of the Lord, exceedingly troubled within, said: Go to my brother, and go around the people of my whole bishopric with all care, and on the third day be ready within the walls of the city of Thérouanne with all of them: and I will be present with those whom, with Christ's help, I shall bring with me from these parts. Then at last, if the Saint himself shall help, I shall be prepared by all means to wrest him away. And when these things had been duly carried out according to the word of the blessed pontiff, on the third day there is present in the city of Thérouanne an innumerable multitude. Then the priest of the Lord with all this multitude follows after the aforesaid abbot with his men with all haste as far as the farm named above. But they, eager to lift up the holy body and to take flight, were by no means able with any multitude to raise it from the ground: and when, an even greater multitude being added, they strove twice and thrice to lift it, it none the less remains so unmoved as if it were held fixed to the ground by certain roots.

[33] carries back the sacred treasure to the church of Saint-Omer, Then without delay for any convenience they hasten their flight, the body of the Saint being left behind. But blessed Folquin, giving them room to flee, and taking that treasure most precious than all gold, by the road he had come with the whole multitude of the peoples carries it back to its own place, whence it had been carried off. But when they came at Thérouanne to the river which is called the Lys ^f, all the above-mentioned multitude of the people without any delay wades on foot through the water of the river: but when the stream had been passed, not the moisture of a single drop appeared on their clothing. And as they went forward through the corn-bearing crops of the fields — for so numerous throngs of the peoples could not avoid them — the ears, as though threshed with sledges, were trodden to the ground by their feet. But when the multitude had passed, they so thickened the furrows that you might plainly recognize that the fields too rejoiced together at the coming of their Protector. But the monks and clerics of both monasteries ^g, being anxious, awaited the outcome of the matter; but after it was given to their eyes to behold, though from afar, the multitude of the people coming, the bell-ropes being pulled, they all gave the voice of praise in the highest.

[34] But the aforesaid Morus, guardian of the church, was then sitting at table about to feast, and there hides it beneath the earth. and, hearing the sound of the bells, he asks what was the cause for which the peoples were exulting with so great joy; and it was told him by those who related it that saint Audomarus had been brought back by Folquin the pontiff; and that for this all the people were exulting with so great gladness. Hearing which, exceedingly troubled, he at once imprecated the anger of God upon those who brought him back. Not yet had the unlawful words fallen from his mouth, when suddenly he fell to the ground, and, stiff in his whole body, with the sinews of his limbs drawn tight, he withered half-alive. So, stupefied, he was carried to saint Bertin's, and there by a long sickness repented of what he had committed in word: for, though sight and hearing were recovered, he was so deprived of sense to the end that he could never perceive ^h in what quarter the monastery of saint Audomarus was seen to be placed. But the prelate Folquin laid the body of blessed Audomarus in the earth ⁱ with great honor on the sixth of the Ides of June, lest it could be carried off in like manner by those who came after. In the time therefore of the glorious Louis king of the Franks ^k it is established that this was thus accomplished, in the eight hundred and forty-third year of the Lord's Incarnation, our same Lord Jesus Christ reigning, to whom is honor and glory, praise and jubilation with the Father and the Holy Spirit for ages of ages. Amen.

[35] At these and like miracles of powers the enemy of the human race grieved that the fame of blessed Audomarus was now spread abroad everywhere, When certain possessions had been taken away from the church of S. Audomarus; and, envying the prosperity of those who served the most glorious Pontiff, began to snatch away by the hands of violent men the lands conferred on his church by certain faithful men of the Eastern parts ^l: whose heats of avarice so far blazed up through many spaces of years that by no

feeling of supplication could anyone recall them to their former church, until by divine compassion Otto ^m the First rose to the kingdom, a most truthful worshipper of God, and a most just promoter of the sacred churches: whose name and fame of holiness the canons of the basilica of saint Audomarus hearing, they began often to hold conference among themselves, inquiring what might need to be done about the taking away of so great a support. At length, having received counsel divinely, as I believe, the judgment of all prevailed that they should carry the pledges of the blessed Father to the places taken from him, so that by divine inspiration and by the presence of so great a Father the aforesaid king, being constrained, might repress the unjust violence, and order the Saints' property that had been taken away to be restored.

[36] On the fourth day of the week therefore in the rogations, which precedes the glorious day of the Lord's Ascension, the canons carry his sacred relics to Nijmegen, the canons, with a great multitude of the common people and no small crowding of clerics, and with wonderful mourning, taking up the body of the holy Prelate, set out on their premeditated journey. And at that same time the glorious king, the aforesaid Otto, had called together at Nijmegen ⁿ the princes of the church of the kingdom, to procure the peace of the Catholic body and to arrange the advantage of the whole empire. Thither therefore they determined to carry the pledges of blessed Audomarus. But when with prosperous progress and glad lodgings they had come to the harbor of Tiel ^o, where, weariness pressing upon them, they wished to refresh themselves with hospitality, the guardian of the church of that farm, behaving proudly and blaspheming the holy relics, was unwilling to unbar for them the doors of the temple: but rebuking greatly the companions and servants of the Saint, and saying that all they were doing was superstitious and raving, he went off to the bath, neglecting the Saint.

[37] [which on the journey became famous by the punishment of a certain man who insulted them,] But the faithful crowd, the doors having been opened by force, brought in the holy relics, and set them upon the altar, as was fitting. Before therefore the priests had completed the mystery of the Lord's Sacrament, the sacristan runs up in a fury, and, raging, approached the altar, and snatched away what was being offered to the Saint by the faithful, constantly extinguishing the lights kindled by the devout, and laying them by, as if for future use, not without the greatest peril to himself. Persisting therefore obstinately in this boldness until evening, he at length betook himself home, and went up upon his bed as though to sleep: but by divine vengeance, as is believed, for the injury inflicted upon the Saint and upon his people, falling asleep past waking, he is announced as dead. But when morning came, the neighbors, hearing this, run up, venerating the Saint's pledges with such gifts as they could. And the Brothers who accompanied the Saint's relics, rendering good for evil, provide the funeral obsequies, committing the bodily part to the earth, and imploring eternal rest for the spiritual. Going forward thence they make for Nijmegen.

[38] [and at Nijmegen are said to have become famous by the sudden sickness of a bishop;] But when the aforesaid king heard that the relics of so great a Father had arrived, filled with immense joy, he rendered thanks to the Almighty. But his brother, the archbishop of the church of Cologne, Bruno [p] by name, having heard the causes of this coming, breaking out into madness of mind, devised that he would seize the holy treasure, and would treat it in some places of his own with a worthy service of veneration, but would send the clerics away into foreign regions. But the merciful Lord, who knows all things before they are done, did not permit saint Audomarus to be exiled from that place which, while he lived, he chose for himself by divine disposition. For on that same night, in whose morning these things were to be perpetrated, the omnipotence of the Lord terrified that same archbishop with a wonderful fear: for after he had, sound and brisk, gone up in his accustomed manner from supper to his couch to rest, an intolerable pain and languor suddenly seized him through all his limbs, and much blood too dripping through his nostrils threatened the nearness of death before midnight came.

[39] and at length those goods are restored to the Saint's church. At length the prelate, remembering what he had devised against the Saint and his people, presently began with the laments of penitence to wash away the filthiness of his heart, promising also with pure and simple heart that he would obtain from the king all the things for which blessed Audomarus had come, for him and for his servants [\*], if he should be restored to his former health by his intervening merits. At this the bishop at once recovered, and, leaping from his bed, hastened prostrate with lowered face to prayer, to render thanks to God and to saint Audomarus. But on the morrow, going to his brother and making known to him the whole outcome of the matter, he began to intercede for the Saint's property. And the king, greatly rejoicing at his brother's health, did not delay to fulfill whatever the archbishop had asked. And so he restored to saint Audomarus the lands [q] long taken from him, and appointed two advocates, Wichmann and Hermann, that they might be an impregnable shield to the Saint and to his servants against all molestations. Blessed Audomarus, gleaming with such tokens of miracles, is carried back to his own place, and with the greatest honor is laid again in his own monastery, as he had been before.

[40] These things concerning the manner of life and the virtues of the most holy prelate Audomarus we have set forth in a brief discourse. [The conclusion of the Life, in which some things narrated more clearly before are repeated.] For the rest, let the reader note that a very great forest of his virtues lies hidden, of which some hidden store [r] the negligence of earlier writers, and some things the judgment of moderns has passed over in silence, on account of the weariness of readers. Many times, in short, at his venerable sepulcher are beheld the barriers of deaf ears laid open, the light long denied restored to the eyes of the blind, the proper offices recalled to the mute tongue, the soles of the lame forming their former footsteps, and the violence of other evil chances put to flight. If the heap of all these were put into a volume, it would be reckoned burdensome [\] to the reader rather than necessary. And saint Audomarus ruled the church for the space of six lustra. But in the last year of his apostolate, on the day of his laying down, that is, on the fifth of the Ides of September, having entered the basilica and celebrated the mystery of the Lord's Body and Blood [s], with his disciples standing about and weeping, full of the grace of the Holy Spirit, he passed to Christ. His body was translated by the most blessed abbot Bertin and the choir of monks, and was buried with glory in the monastery of Sithiu, four miles distant from the city of the Morini [\], our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ reigning, to whom with God the Father and the Holy Spirit is honor and glory, power and magnificence, through all ages of ages. Amen…

[41] Since our Lord [t] has wrought a certain miracle through the merits of blessed Audomarus, A woman, working on the feast of the Bringing-back, is divinely punished; we have thought it worthy to set it forth to your kindness. For every good thing shines forth more beautifully when it is confirmed by the knowledge of very many. When an edict had gone out through the whole territory of blessed Audomarus that his Bringing-back should be celebrated with the due service of veneration [u], it happened that the fingers of a little woman, far advanced in her days, of praiseworthy repute, who on the day of the Bringing-back was drawing out the distaff in hope of gain, and by the exercise of spinning was setting herself against the divine will, were contracted, so that they were fixed tenaciously, nay immovably, in the middle of her palm. To behold that miracle an infinite multitude of men flocks together: concerning the little woman it is constantly asserted that that sin happened by her own fault. Very many however, mistrusting about what had been done, and suspecting that the old woman had feigned herself crippled in order to extort something, try to disjoin from the palm the fingers contracted by the divine miracle. But what God's power does renders the efforts of men wholly frustrated. The faith of those who before mistrusted is increased because of a miracle wrought so openly, and hearts before greatly wavering are made believing.

[42] The old woman has tears of compunction toward God, she cries out more with the devotion of the heart than with the vociferation of the mouth; with a great throng accompanying her, she is brought to the basilica of blessed Audomarus. Those standing about cry out and, repenting, she is healed at the sepulcher: while the little woman cries out; none the less do they weep while she weeps: but with tears poured out she cries out with her whole heart, because her mind is not divided: she pours herself out wholly to God, she offers herself wholly, she acknowledges herself, that God may pardon: her eyes have brought down streams of waters, because she has not kept the law of God. The office of the Mass being celebrated according to custom, each returns to his own. That wretched woman, struck by the scourge of God, awaits health from him who is himself compassion, himself mercy. About the space of evening time, the sacristans staying with her, and praying to God together with her, with a crackling noise of the sinews her fingers return to their former state: they stretch out to the property which they had before: they sing praises and hymns together: man comes to a deep heart, and God is exalted.

[43] a girl seized for the same cause by a manifest token. At another time, on that very same day of the solemnity, a girl, the veneration of the day being neglected, while she gives her labor to sewing a shirt, is seized by the hidden judgment of God: for the shirt is found sprinkled with blood as a proof of the seizure. Which miracle, before it was committed to writing, was shown by the testimony of many to have been true. Amazement seized the girl; she accused herself as guilty: whom God, as she accused herself, excused. For the greater evidence of the fact, in a holy synod [x] in which the salvation of souls is treated of.

ANNOTATIONS.

p. Bruno, the brother of the emperor Otto and archbishop of Cologne, was a man outstanding in piety, as is established from his Life. Wherefore the things which are here asserted about his contrivings are not likely, especially since Folquin does not touch upon them even with a word. Nevertheless, if anything of truth underlies it, Bruno could have judged that unjust things were being sought, and could have disapproved that the sacred relics were being removed so far from their own church for that end: which indeed appears more to be wondered at than to be imitated in our time.

q. By these words the author suggests that all things were obtained which were sought: and the same John of Ypres and Malbrancq have handed down. But Folquin, after the words already given, adds only this: But having partly and prosperously acquired the things for which they had come, and the church at Frekenas having been received by royal donation, they returned with the Saint's relics to their own place. And so they obtained a part, not all. This translation happened between the year 954 and 961, as is gathered from the age of Bruno the archbishop and of Regenold the abbot. John of Ypres, chap. 27, part 2, narrating this translation, wrongly says that the relics were carried beyond the Rhine past Nijmegen, and wrongly adds also the relics of S. Bertin, of which there is no word in Folquin and others. On the contrary the author of this Life wrongly attributes everything to the canons of S. Audomarus, since the Bertinian abbot was present with some monks.

r. Enteca is read in the codex, whether rightly or faultily I shall not divine. If it is an adjective derived from entecus, the writer meant to say of which certain hidden things etc. Thus the word could have been formed from entheca, which in the middle age was used for a storehouse, chest, deposited treasure, and the like; unless the author wished to use this very word, and to say, of which the treasure etc.

s. This with the preceding the author has from the second Life; but there I have already observed both that those things are not read in the first Life, and that they do not seem true. The Saint's death this very Life has more rightly at num. 21. Hence it is clearly plain that everything in this Life has been compiled without suitable discrimination; and that is again clear from the following miracles, which are read in the same codex.

t. After a moral discourse on mutual love, in which it is said of Audomarus: Blessed Audomarus, the pious confessor of the Lord, was a lily, because he shone in this life with the whiteness of chastity and of the other virtues; since he rejected the blandishments of this world, and panted with the devotion of his whole heart, with the love of God and of his neighbor, toward him who is the way and the truth; there follow two miracles, which I here append.

u. This word had been omitted in our codex, but was in the transcript of Saint-Omer. Further, from this miracle and the following it is clear that the festival of the Bringing-back, of which I treated in the Commentary, num. 45, was formerly kept with cessation from servile works.

x. What that synod was, I do not know. For the rest, there afterward follows a moral exhortation to venerate S. Audomarus: and so the Life ends.

\* i.e. to him and to his ministers

\ onerosus magis*

\* i.e. Thérouanne